|synaptic disunion|

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

listen...III

"How long have you been here?" I decided to start the conversation this afternoon. I wanted some questions answered. I hoped they would be answers that I could understand.

"A long time." Was the simple answer.

I decided to ask a question that demanded a longer answer. "You told me that it looked different before. I assume you were talking about yourself? This place. What did it look like."

"It looked different."

Ok, that didn't work. So I countered with "In what way?"

"Those things weren't here." the voice said. I instinctively looked over at the buildings of the bushiness park.

"How long have the been here?" I asked.

"Not long."

"Was there anything here before?"

"Just the trees, and the others."

"Others?" I asked. Now we were getting somewhere.

"Yes, others like you, only, different."

"Ah, Native Americans."

"Americans?"

"Never mind. It really doesn't' t mean anything anyway." It was then that I decided to take another approach to this conversation. "Do you have any questions for me?"

"Yes. What are you doing here?"

"Ah, well, I'm taking a class over in the building over there about virtualizing hardware. It will help us to consolidate hardware by putting more servers on less hardware."

Silence.

"That's not what you were asking, was it?"

Silence.

"What am I doing here? Here, on the earth? Here in Seattle?"

"Here." it said, without any impatience, or malice. Throughout our entire conversation, the voice remained calm and comforting, like a warm breeze on a cool day.

"I suppose, I'm living life. I'm growing. I'm not sure what you mean."

"What are you doing here?" This was the first time the voice had showed any emphasis.

"You know, I have another concern." I began. "If I decide to write this conversation down, my readers will likely think that I'm stealing yet another idea, from yet another writer. People might think that I'm stealing Daniel Quinn's idea of using a "talking" Ape to learn lessons about society and life. I don't want them to think that, because Daniel Quinn started out good, and ended up drowning in his own thesis. Did you ever talk to Daniel Quinn?"

"Yes."

"He didn't understand did he?"

"No."

"I didn't think so. But you were asking, why am I here."

"Yes."

"The absolute truth is, I don't know."

Labels: listen

: toadman : at Wednesday, April 26, 2006 |