The Good, the Evil, and the all-you-can-eat buffet

It is an endless story, apparently. It's a snake going after its own tail, a coin that you can go on and flip forever. So many people have been busting their brains and their research grants over it. Is being and doing good hereditary? Are we conditioned to it? Not all abused children grow up to rape somebody, right? Has Goodness evolved through natural selection? Do we have a choice? Free will? Is there a point in being or doing “Good”?

Is there Heaven and Hell?

Is there Heaven or Hell?

And so on.

Remarkably, there are myriads of people out there, lacking stories to tell, not to mention research grants or brains, or a pulpit for that matter, who are also fiddling with such questions. The Internet, for one, is littered with their agonizing banalities. We got lectured the other day by such an otherwise well-meaning fellow. He gave us the parameters. The genes and the environment. Religion. The parents. The lack thereof. One thing was clear, there is plenty of theory around, for fellows with time in their hands and no real problems.

What's a poor blogger to do?

Start with a disclaimer. Not everything is supposed to make sense. If you can't take it from us, take it from Wittgenstein.

Then an observation, in the form of a rhetorical question: could there be anybody out there, anybody who can read this at least, who has never heard of all this? The concept of Good and Evil? If you are not interested in all this, you are in all likelihood not interested in all this.

Then forget about research and brains. We have feelings too, you know.

And then cry for help, obviously! Get a couple of specialists! Their words are out there for grabs! That's what they are for!

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For the brain in agony, we have, quite predictably, some Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, from “As I sat sadly by her side”:

When will you ever learn?
[...]God does not care for your benevolence
Anymore than he cares for the lack of it in others
Nor does he care for you to sit
At windows in judgment of the world He created
While sorrows pile up around you
Ugly, useless and over-inflated

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For the spiritually troubled, we turn to the recent movie of Craig Brewer, Black Snake Moan. The good reverent R.L. is counseling the troubled nymphomaniac Rae, who has hit a tragic low after her dearly loved boyfriend Ronnie went away to join the army. There is something about heaven and redemption she does not understand. In fact, she finds it “fucking stupid”:

RAE:You can't hurt people... and then just say, I'm sorry, and then everything just gets washed away. Why would heaven want people like that. People who... do what they want and then... switch.

R.L.:I'm gonna tell you somethin', and it's just gonna be between you and me.
I think folks carry on about heaven too much. Like it's some all-you-can-eat buffet up in the clouds. And folks just gonna do as they're told so they can eat what they want behind some pearly gates. I can go to Shoney's for that.

(R.L.):There's sin in my heart. There's evil in this world. But when I got no one... I talk to God. I ask for strength. I ask for forgiveness. Not for peace at the end of my days when there's no more life to live and no more good to do, but today. Right now.

(R.L.):What's your heaven? What gives you peace?

RAE:(struggling to speak through her tears): Ronnie.

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For the struggling humanist, we have the confetti of Kurt Vonnegut illustrating this post.

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We could go on forever. Because this is hot. It has been hot forever. Good and Evil, Love and Hate, Life and Death. As forever-hot issues go, we shall always keep in mind the following exchange between Blackadder and Lord Percy:

Percy: I intend to discover, this very afternoon, the secret of alchemy. The hidden art of turning base things into… gold.
Blackadder: I see. And the fact that this secret has eluded the most intelligent people since the dawn of time doesn't dampen your spirits?

Angels stole your missing socks

Good day, our dear readers! We hope you had at least half as lovely a weekend as we did. And that you've aired yourselves sufficiently. Always important. We'll keep on telling you until you have to run out for air.

We had a visitor in the weekend, our friend Biko Azinuth. He's quite a character. And Belgian, which is how we got hooked, see previous post. Biko is an aspiring writer, and full of stories. But he wasn't there to impose on us with the characters in his fiction, he's not the obsessive-neurotic type of author. (Not that we would mind. Those guys maintain very popular blogs about how they cannot sit down and write. Traffic guaranteed.) What he talked about was his childhood pets! Dogs, cats, turtles. As a result, it's impossible for us to post anything sharp today.

We started talking about dogs, because we are planning to have one. Biko is a fan of boxers and has had almost half a dozen of them up to now. Sweet, playful, funny creatures – we are enchanted ourselves. One of his boxers would get so melty when he cuddled her, that she fainted. Another one was extremely stubborn, impossible to train, a very strong personality, but still sweet. She wouldn't let him pack for a trip – she would poke into the suitcase and steal his socks all the time. All boxers were fascinated with the birds in the garden. They would watch them attentively as they chirped around the bird house.

Biko has also owned a cat, Prutz. A crazy creature, really crazy. She would attack you out of the blue, while (you thought she was) napping in your lap. When she died, the doctor discovered her brain was full of sugar crystalls. She had been a diabetic nut. Prutz was a merciless hunter too. She would give the family a scare by bringing in a bug or a mouse, proudly laying them dead or half-dead at their feet. She'd take a nap on Kika the boxer, planting her claws in her skin so as not to slip off. Kika did not mind.

He's also had a German Shepherd, Tina, when he was a very small boy. He used to lay on her in the garden and watch the sky. At the same time he owned a turtle, Piet. Piet would listen to his name. You could call him and there he would set off slowly to nibble on his tomato. Later he would take a stroll in the garden, dumping his excess all along, so that next thing you knew, tomato plants would sprout all over the place. They didn't know what to do with all the tomatoes.

Piet was not afraid of coming down the stairs. He would go for it. Jump he'd go, land on his back, and then wait for Tina to arrive and turn him over, back on his feet. Time and again.

In the winter it was hibernation time for Piet. He would lay in the basement, inside a box cushioned with leaves.

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Our brains soothed by these stories, we slept like babies. And that's the best way to sleep. I, Mimi, dreamed of a heaven, where all our thought-to-be-dead pets and animals of all sorts played happily together, sniffed and cuddled, jumped in ponds, examined the cacti over the hill; skipped around poking toys, chasing one another, some waiting for their owners, some already spoiling theirs. Biko's joyful boxers ran after tennis balls and wild birds and chickens, and funny heavenly creatures I could not quite make out, then rested in their nests full of his missing socks and underwear. That's where all your missing socks have gone! The heaven of boxers.

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Our new landlord does not allow big dogs – heaven knows why he should prefer us to have a handbag-sized, neurotic bundle of barking hell -- so instead of a boxer we will settle for a French Bulldog. Aren't they, after all, “a big dog in a small package”? Looking forward to it! We'll let you know!