Who am I and where am I?

Who am I and where am I?

Morning has broken, but no blackbird has been found, not in this region. Only birds of carrion, the crows, are hovering here and there in this desolate scrubby landscape of America. The crows are black, but they are not blackbirds. There is a world of difference between a black bird and a blackbird. That’s the wonderful world of linguistics. I am not a scholar on linguistics. I leave that matter to other people of surprising talent and curiosity. I am not a scholar on anything, but I know a little bit of some subjects which interest me. One subject that interests me is my own little self. Ever since I discovered that I could think for myself at an early age, such as God didn’t make Man in his own image, but the other way around, and later found my thinking was affirmed and confirmed by minds which are far more luminous than mine, I have embarked on a solitary journey of watching over and analyzing myself. And I have tried to be as objective as I can. I live in reality, not in fantasies. Unlike some men, I don’t run away from myself and this world. I am all I have and this world is the only world I know. When I write, I strive for clarity of expression, not obfuscation, in the service of communicating facts, logic, and truth as I see them, even when I am in full debate with somebody. I also strive to live by those wonderful words of the drunkard from Oxford, Mississippi when he accepted the Nobel Prize, words that Nam Le found resonating and used them in the very first story of his collection: love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice. I first came across that famous acceptance speech at the tender age of sixteen. I understood the lexicon meanings of the speech then, but I didn’t quite grasp the full import and magnificence of the speech until years later, after I had suffered from the slings and arrows of human duplicity.

One way for me to learn about myself is to compare myself with others. While I realize that I am only of average intelligence, I am more driven than most in the pursuit of knowledge and truth, within the confines and limitations of my intellect. I also find myself largely different than most people I have run into. I don’t casually fling certain words of accusation and condemnation to somebody if those words also characterize me perfectly; in other words, I don’t practice hypocrisy.

I also try to be consistent. Thus, I found ABC's recent remark about the poet To Huu deeply disturbing. He wrote at the end of his email that “Thank God and Marx that his colleagues didn’t agree.” To thank both God and Marx in the same sentence was too novel to me. I know ABC has the penchant and propensity for oracular, cryptic statements, but Marx was an atheist and of course a father of Marxism. To thank Marx is to imply a certain intellectual debt and affinity to this poverty-stricken German of Jewish descent and to tell the world that one is a Marxist. That was how I reacted to the statement of ABC. I hope I am mistaken in my perception.

I also try not to be vulgar in speech, not in public anyway. I am careful not to use certain taboo words which are deemed highly offensive in polite circles. So, I found a recent article posted in this forum containing a Vietnamese taboo word denoting female sex organ with its complete spelling in full splendor deeply offensive. I wonder where the demarcation line of propriety is and whether we can be entitled to use all vulgarisms when the mood strikes without showing respect to the sensibilities of the readers. Mind you, I am no prude, vulgarisms have their use and place, but not in a public forum. Certain Vietnamese taboo words are powerful and should only used in the privacy of one’s bedroom to enhance eroticism when engaging in love-making. One should not casually fling those words around in public, not when one wants respect from fellow men. One should not even forward articles containing such words because the very act of forwarding implies one’s concurrence and acceptance.

Morning is in full swing. And the heat is rising. And I feel restless after exercising my brain. Now I have a need for physical exercises. I had better stop writing for now and go for my daily jog and see if I can avoid heatstroke and heart-attack. I like to put my body to a test. I like to dance with Death.

Wissai
July 5, 2009