A Letter

The following is the contents of a paper I found wedged behind a TV in the lobby of the business building. Evidently, it was meant for someone else.

Dear Seth,

I hope this letter finds you well. We at the meetinghouse have missed your presence these last several months. You will be pleased to know that we have welcomed another member into our fold. She has taken on the name Valentinia in remembrance of the great teacher. She has an affinity for seeing things behind the curtain in a way few new students do. You will get along well with her whenever you return.

You will also be pleased to note the progress we have made in the compilation of your words into our first publication. We have worked diligently over these last few months to ensure that your wisdom is adequately contained and preserved. It has not been the same since you left. We all pray the highest authorities have seen it fit to preserve you so that your wisdom may continue to enlighten.

I am concerned with Paulus and his progress is developing his senses. We found out that he is more tied to the carnal than we thought and we cannot make progress until his inner alignment changes. Perhaps we were mistaken in allowing him into our circle. What is your advice for nurturing the development of eyes to see and ears to hear? We have tried walking in the path of the great teacher but have found our abilities lacking.

I also want to relay to you my own message for your benefit, though it hardly compares to the products of your erudition. I was impressed by my encounter with a street preacher recently to reflect on the nature of the divine. It seems even the loudest of the voices in this city cheering on behalf of the Father are as blind to the true divinity as their god is. Let us not forget what the great authors wrote long ago

“Their chief is blind; because of his power and his ignorance and his arrogance he said, with his power, ‘It is I who am God; there is none apart from me.’ When he said this, he sinned against the entirety. And this speech got up to incorruptibility; then there was a voice that came forth from incorruptibility, saying, ‘You are mistaken, Samael’ – which is, ‘god of the blind.’”

Let us not forget that the so called Father is but the lowest, rotting, fruit of the tree. May incorruptibility grant us knowledge and freedom from the illusions of this world.

With great respect and admiration,

Sophia

I can only wonder how this letter found its way behind a TV. I wonder, too, how old this letter is. Is this a group here in the city or is this a reference to some show or book?

The House With Narrow Windows

On a languid street corner near the old high-school was a house I was always fascinated by. It was a large house, with peeling paint, and narrow windows revealing bits and pieces of the rooms within. On the bus in the morning I could see a warm, incandescent glow illuminating a cramped kitchen, in the afternoon I could see the faded lettering on the sign out front. It may have once been a restaurant, or a small hotel, or some other business that had long since fled.

I imagined who must live there. An old man, worn by time. An austere life, a life defined by struggle. I imagined how grown up I would feel living that imagined life. I felt sad that it wasn’t mine.

On a forgotten corner of a narrow street that crossed the local bike path sat a house with narrow windows. I always thought it was an apartment. When I was young I took my bike out at the blue hour and imagined who must live there. A warm light glowed through the blinds, cutting through the cool blue atmosphere. I was barely a teenager then.

I imagined the young professional that must live there. He had game nights with his friends, he listened to grown up music and lived a grown up life. I imagined how mature and liberated I would feel living in a place like that. I felt sad that it wasn’t mine.

I got older. My life changed. My perspectives changed. I saw that house near the school again, and it looked run-down. I saw that house on the path, and it looked sterile. Where did the warmth retreat to? Where did that young professional go? Where did the austere old man end up? Did they ever live in those places?

I have never met the owners of these places. I don’t know their name nor their face. I never want to. The people who live there I already know and the lives they live give me life.

Systems Theory

My head is full and my heart is empty. Another day another day another day, marching towards graduation. Like so many other mornings I sit in a lecture picking up what the professor puts down on the board. Outside snow dances in the twilight, pirouetting in the icy winds. Its odd, I’ve been going here for years but it still feels like a foreign place. I know the best sitting places for charging my laptop, the best bathrooms with the fewest people, the fastest routes above and below ground to each building, but it still feels all wrong. And the snow falls falls falls painting an unfamiliar world in a cold wet layer.

The function of a silicon diode is relatively simple. A voltage is applied and as it approaches a certain limit the current it allows through increases in an exponential relationship. So simple so simple so simple yet it is the ground on which the entirety of modern computing technology is built. From it came the transistor, and from the transistor came the logic gate. AND OR NOT NOR NAND XOR INV the names of the roots from which springs adders and subtractors, multiplexers and demultiplexers, ROM and RAM. Even further still ALUs, registers, I/O interfaces, and on into CPUS and GPUS. How brilliant to learn the foundations of a world most take for granted?

Yet still still still I sit here waiting for something to happen. I know it all, I test well, I see the pattern language of which the entire world is composed yet nothing nothing nothing feels like it should.

When I was a kid I had visions of university life. Fiery social situations, art and soul everywhere, adventure and new experiences. Yet, the experience I came to learn was one of quiet and solitude. New experiences, sure, but rare. In general, more of the same with a slightly different coat of paint. Maybe I was desensitized to new things in the same way our eyes perceive color less vibrantly as we age. How horrible? Irreversible magic death. Nothing new under the sun sun sun so they say.

Have you ever seen a picture of a city in Russia during the blue hour? Let me paint it for you. A single light on in an endless Soviet apartment block. Gray skies and yellow street lights. The dull dull dull grays of a life among the ruins. Its cozy isn’t it? To imagine a sparse apartment, a jar of pickles in a cupboard, and a loaf of bread on the counter. A couch with holes in the fabric. A television older than the students who live there. Strangers strangers strangers in a homely homely homely land.

Alienation. Not a nation of aliens or a strange EDM artist from 2004. Alienation. Having no place. I know so much about how the parts fit together. I know about how the wholes interact into even larger wholes. Systems within systems systems systems ever and ever increasing in complexity. I know how it all works. I could build the infrastructure. Yet it doesn’t work for me. And I feel the same same same.

The Talking Heads, surely you’ve heard of them? “Same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was” David Byrne would echo with increasing hysteria into the microphone on Once In a Lifetime. “Well, how did I get here?” he would ask before launching into the chorus. A question I ask myself frequently. Where is that social ecstasy, the fire of life, community and camaraderie? I see how all these silicon parts fit together, a world designed with interlocking systems, yet outside the people seem ever more disconnected. I can piece all the systems in the world together, but the human factor remains out of reach. So I sit here, my head full and my heart empty. Waiting waiting waiting.

Guest Book

I was browsing old websites from the early 2000's and was fascinated by looking through the guest book pages. People left messages that have survived decades untouched like hieroglyphs on the walls of digital pyramids. So let's add one to The Silent Page! If you visit this site, leave a comment on this page with your name, a note, or anything else you want to save for the future! Cheers to us a few decades from now!