Fractalalia

Jacques Derrida writes somewhere about a novel by a French writer named Philippe Sollers. I believe the book was called Numbers and I have never read it myself. It was an experimental novel in that it was printed in loose leaf, and the re-arrangement of the pages in any order would still leave a readable narrative. I don’t imagine an English translation would be a piece of cake to dash off, but not having read the book doesn’t stop me being intrigued by the idea.

And that is just what this Substack excursion will be, passages thrown in the air to land where they may, like jack-straws in the children’s game or the yarrow stalks the ancient Chinese sages used to throw to determine the arrangement of lines in a hexagram relating to the I Ching. I think of it as ‘Fractalalia’. I’ll let you unpack that.

I see that most writers on Substack are journalists, and more power to them. I mean that figuratively and literally. Outlets such as Substack really do empower – one of the enemy’s buzzwords we must co-opt – genuine journalists, by which I mean those who have not passed through the cultural Marxist finishing school that is journalism college. It was Tony Blair’s unmuzzled bully Alastair Campbell who said that journalism was becoming increasingly op-ed, and even the Devil tells truth on occasion.

These posts are a type of journalism, written on the hoof and checked only for grosser typos. It is a sort of stream of unconsciousness. The situation I am in seemed to be to be worth picking apart, to have its innards displayed. Why not? This is why we write, no?

Papi’s death may have opened up a door for me out of living with this fucking psychotic. The house is being emptied as I write, and I will discuss the plan with the onsite a manager and the unlikeable little man to whom I pay the rent. I hope this works out.

Today was mildly psycho, a sort of orange alert in the psyche of the Golem I have been cast in life’s dicing. He sat around with Eduardo, who has been claiming he is moving to San José today and has finally made good his word. They didn’t drink much. I got a surprise call from a Nicaraguan guitarist I actually do get along with, asking me to fill in for him on bass with a blues guy on Saturday. That should be amusing. I haven’t played bass since I last played with the same guy about three years ago. In fact, I haven’t touched a bass at all, my Rickenbacker 4001 having been fucked in flooding.

The jungle was quiet again today, although the night-shift of cicadas has just clocked on. Another day in a paradise full of serpents.