How Far Does the Road Go?
Because we know how it ends.
Photo by Raoul Droog on Unsplash [Much thanks - explore and use Raoul’s work.]
”No, his mind is not for rent
To any god or government.
Always hopeful, yet discontent
He knows changes aren’t permanent –
But change is
What you say about his company
Is what you say about society
-Catch the witness – Catch the wit
-Catch the spirit – Catch the spit
“The world is the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his eyes are wide”
from Tom Sawyer
RUSH (Neil Peart)
MOVING PICTURES (1981)
Part One
Something deep in my memory, much older than that song above, reminds me of experiences as a child when, now and again, I intuited just how far the world went, how tremendous and more than me it was, is — and yet I was part of it. My eyes felt powerfully wide, the eyes of my heart and hopes; still not enough to encompass reality itself. And that was electrifying. How far might I go ? Who might I pull off becoming?
More than I could imagine, maybe. More, always more, summoned out to recklessly, fearlessly meet the Mystery.
Sometimes now, teaching, I catch the younger kids who seem to have the same glimpse of something More and Greater and exciting out there, waiting for them.
”Eyes as wide as the world.”
T. Coraghessan Boyle, a wonderful writer, apparently coined those words in his story “Princess.” Problem is, I’ve been saying it for years, too, and never read Boyle’s tale. Think I worked it into a mediocre, but sincere, poem back in the 1990s. It’s too — pregnant — for many folks not to have snatched it down out of the noosphere simultaneously.
Thinking on it, though, I realized it was the line from the Rush song that gave it to me in 1981:
The world is the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his eyes are wide
Less and less does the world strike me as open, as an opening to everything, anything. With age, with damage, with pain, the whole place has narrowed around me like the walls of a box. A jail cell. A coffin. A hole in the dirt.
Failure of imagination. Erosion of hope. Less life in front of me than behind, now.
My eyes are dim, children. I do not see the same way anymore and all that I see seems small, worn, repetitious, pointless. A small red light off in the night’s distance blinking off. On. Off. On. Until, one day, the power fails and there is nothing but the blackness to press in: hot, humid darkness.
This, then, was what it was all about? Really?
Part Two
A man’s life does not amount to much, no matter how hard or how well he’s thrown himself into the breech, however many times. Or whether he deserted, laid down drunk in a ditch and aspirated his own vomit. All of us are headed for “man’s long home.” It has nothing to do with deserving — it simply is. Unavoidably, it is.
What was it I glimpsed as a child, that wide, burning world out there, beyond the horizon? What do I see in the recognition of children’s eyes when they flame up even now? An illusion? A cruel lie? And, if so, a lie told by who and to whom? It is there, that far off goodness, the Mystery… but it is still far off from me. Me and my fewer years ahead than behind.
So disasters no longer resonate with me the way they may have once. Not from selfishness nor grandiosity, less from imperviousness, but because there is little of me left to lose. Less of me to hope for, less of me to worry about. Idiocy and danger begin to seem little more than what they truly are: the impotent glissading of icy worms; the shrill threats of power mad little people. Little people who, too, will not amount to very much at all, eventually.
They create a world of mazes and only they know the patterns; but for any child, anyone of imagination, the walls of their pretended prisons are non-existent. At our beginnings, we hardly notice their walls. Because children and the hopeful see beyond the surface of things and into the fiery heart of Being, into the creative, burning Song of G-d. And while we can see, we are not trapped by the crawling things and their small, relentless shrieks and threats of horror.
Here, toward the end of things, the creatures in the cold dead dirt and the servants of hatred and misery do not mean much to me at all. You beat a man down enough and, if he survives, his scars and bones go numb, his ears begin to shut down. He hurts, but it is far away somehow — almost as if the pain belonged to someone else . His guts are hollow like a furnace awaiting fuel. He moves slow, but inexorably. When he goes, he will not go easily but he will not be stopped by simple means.
He will walk off into the dream, whatever stands in his way, fiery swords and all before the gate.
Just because — because he has seen, in his day, further than you can guess and he simply wants to go home now, beyond the end of all things.
”I know you've deceived me
Now here's a surprise
I know that you have
'Cause there's magic in my eyes
”I can see for miles and miles
And miles and miles and miles
Oh yeah”
from I Can See For Miles
THE WHO (Pete Townshend)
THE WHO SELL OUT (1967)
Part Three
An administrator told me, months and months ago, that “no one is irreplaceable.” I’ve no idea, really, why this was said. Not for one day in my life have I been deluded enough to believe that I am important or essential enough to think of myself as “irreplaceable.” I’ve been replaced more times now than I recall — it becomes expected that, at some point, I’ll be handed my walking papers or I’ll simply have to go.
I’ve been replaced in two marriages so far.
I was replaced by my parents.
I never had any close family of which to speak.
My school and hometown didn’t even notice I existed outside being an irritant.
I lost a couple of girlfriends I dearly loved; male friends I loved walked off and stopped talking to me… or died. The dead don’t talk much. Neither do those who simply don’t like you.
I passed through three universities, benefited from them, learned what I could; but they were not homes for me to live within.
The number of jobs I’ve held at this point is difficult to recall — and there’s no point. Ten years here, seven years there; eleven doing this; two and a half doing that… .
Even now, teaching at college or at public school, I’ve no permanent contracts. It’s year by year, at best. And all it takes is one absurd event so you aren’t rehired - and trust me, you cannot imagine how small and petty an event, what manner of unimportant misunderstanding might lead to you no longer having a paycheck and insurance. It may even just be an institutional financial decision - you did nothing to cause that. They never tell you. It’s blue collar white collar work, and no union.
If I want to get fired while keeping my reputation and possibility of certification and future teaching jobs, I have to hire a lawyer. Out of my own pocket… or credit card. Like a wealthy person.
Children can concoct allegations, lies and half-truths, that get you fired simply so the school avoids looking bad in the press or to parents of potential new students. These lies don’t have to be sexual in nature, either — it just doesn’t take much in a non-union shop to get a teacher fired… or “not rehired.”
”No one is irreplaceable.”
Though, on the disposability scale, some of us are much closer to being tossed in the wood chipper than those above us and those above us will get rid of someone before anything vaguely threatens their livelihoods or reputations. Administration does not exist to protect, help, or retain teachers. At the slightest whiff of something that will not fit the school’s PR, you, my friend, will be fed to the wild dogs… whether you actually did anything worthy of punishment or not. It’s all the same, just so long as we keep up appearances.
Not only am I not irreplaceable, I was made to be replaced. I’m the guy they call in to fill a spot until the scrubbed up, fresh, shiny young person with a great resume arrives to take the job I’ve kept warm for them.
But look around me in this state, this nation, this world - if Hell doesn’t exist, there are some people who will not rest until they turn this place into The Inferno, punish everyone they hate, torment physically or psychologically everyone they disagree with, and make life small, impossible, miserable. That’s where I am and that’s where you are.
My personal problems are nothing by comparison to people being snatched off the streets, disappeared to black site torture centers, all while law and our belief that every human being has inalienable rights that government exists to protect and defend has been tossed in the presidential toilet and pissed on by savages.
Who am I in the face of that disaster? What are my problems?
Apparently, none of us is irreplaceable. The inherent worth and dignity of a human being, our irreplaceable uniqueness, was one of those bright, burning visions I glimpsed as a kid, a vision that children, philosophers, prophets, and fools still see… but a world, a maze of lies has ben built by hateful fools to cover up that truth, to manipulate us all, to make us bend the knee and beg the idols not to remove us too quickly, not to torment us overmuch, to choose to ruin our neighbor, not ourselves.
So much for the True, Good, the Beautiful. It seems those are good slogans for sales, but any idiot who sincerely pursues and hopes for them has to be put down like a rabid animal. And fast. So the rest learn their place in this world’s real order. And that order is Power, not truth, goodness, or beauty. Get it straight quick, kid, and learn to screw over other people while you’re young so, when you inherit the system, you understand how this game works.
Start with your teachers. They’re legally vulnerable from so many direction getting rid of them is wickedly easy. A little lie here, an exaggeration there, some cooperation on a half-believable tale. Plus, teachers temper your will to power with exposure to truth and goodness: limits. And who are they to limit you?
At this point, the federal and state governments under this regime will even help you. By the time it’s over, unless your parents are wealthy and force you to go to a private prep school, there may be no public school to plague you: thus, no teachers. But why wait? Get to work having schools and classrooms cater to your desires, not to the demands of these idiotic subjects: history; literature; sciences. Make them let you play soccer and baseball and basketball all day — because all of you are going pro, aren’t you? You’re going to be Big Stars. Sure you are. No one needs teachers for that.
And what’s one less, anyway, in the land of the disposable, home of the replaceable? Inherent value? What sort of hogwash is THAT?! Get on with acting as if that is a fairytale of the silliest sort. Value is solely economic, utilitarian: The end. What use you can get out of someone determines their value. No use? No value.
The useless can go wander the outer darkness until some disease takes them for lack of medicine and shelter. Or they suicide.
Maybe we can harvest their organs.
Part Four
”I wanted to walk straight on through the red grass and over the edge of the world, which could not be very far away. The light air told me that the world ended here: only the ground and sun and sky were left, and if one went a little farther there would only be sun and sky, and one would float off into them, like the tawny hawks which sailed over our heads making slow shadows in the grass.”
***
”Perhaps we feel like that when we die and become part of something entire, whether it is sun and air, or goodness and knowledge. At any rate, that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great. When it comes to one, it comes as naturally as sleep.”
from MY ÁNTONIA
pages 13, 14
Willa Cather
When I wandered the woods alone as a kid and teenager, that’s how I felt: at ease. Comfortable. Even finding ruins of old houses, old barns was exciting — I could imagine fixing them up, living in them, sleeping until I was “dissolved into something complete and great”— G-d’s own beautiful, starlit dream of peace, forever.
Maybe HaShem and I could have a talk, then, about what this was all about… or maybe it wouldn’t matter so much inside the “artifice of eternity.”
”There is no truth
except inside the Gates of Eden.”
from Gates of Eden
Bob Dylan
Besides, I talked, and talk, to G-d now, in this world, and ask what questions I have, share my worries, my anger, my shame, my failures. Sometimes love, sometimes thankfulness. G-d patiently listens because I am just a little thing; and the Righteous Judge does not eradicate me as a hateful irritant, though sometimes I’m sure I irritate and sometimes my anger approaches hatred, sometimes self-loathing, sometimes hatred for others being oppressed or feeling bullied.
As I grew older, I couldn’t wander those places back home. I was an adult and it suddenly struck me that others were offended when adults wander their property — and the fields and woods I walked were owned by someone, though I rarely knew who. So I stopped doing that, only to relive it in memory and dreams.
In memory and dreams I recall being so very close to the Divine, the Eternal Creator and G-d’s creation, of which I am a small but real part - all of it with inherent worth and irreplaceable value.
But here in the waking world, nearly 60 years old, I feel far away in a fast moving city. I love cities, I love the instant anonymity where no one knows everyone you’re related to and bears you a grudge for it. They don’t recall you were that weird kid that cared about strange things and didn’t do what everyone else did. They don’t recall you walking with stacks of books while reading at the same time. They don’t care your hair was out of style, your clothes were dumb, or that you rarely talked.
In cities, you may be whoever you wish. No one will notice or remember one way or another.
Work, however, is where people notice. It’s as if you died and were reincarnated in elementary school where you can’t say “dirty words” and if someone doesn’t understand you, it’s assumed you probably were “cussing;” you must conform, there are teams run by the adults who used to be cool kids and are used to being pampered, having their egos patted. And you’re just there to work and avoid anything like office politics, if not politics in general.
If you don’t kiss the right person’s shoes, you’re going nowhere; and if you stay out of sight, off radars, and solve problems alone or nearly alone, no one notices you do any work. You aren’t blowing your own horn, so obviously you are mediocre and are on that “easily replaceable” list.
I don’t care about any of these things, folks. Not the work material. I work, but playing games and talking incessantly about work and sports and work and sports is just not for me. This is the sort of thing everyone back in the small town knew about me already and had me labeled as “boring” as well as “weird.”
They weren’t wrong. But I went to the city to mind my own business and just stay out of trouble, really. Quietly go about my art and writing, studying philosophy and history of ideas. Make a couple of like-minded friends. Maybe share some of this with kids in return for enough pay and insurance to live on until my road runs out and I go away, get out of the way, praying some of my students use what I shared to go make something better, to do some creative repair work. None of this was given to me to keep — it was to give away, to send out into the world through others who will benefit from it and be of benefit with it.
Did I manage to do that this year? Will I be tossed out the door, reputation mangled by some troubled kids? How much will I have to pay that lawyer to maybe get fired yet retain my ability to teach at another school?
Will there be schools to teach at?
I picked up a pizza last night and watched the kitchen crew, mostly young men, do what you do in a pizza kitchen - cook and crack jokes. I did that job back in college for a year and… well, I began to wonder if it comes with insurance. I wondered how much of a pay cut I could take and just go make pizza again, be dead silent, refuse to be a manager, do my shift - and the shift of all the irresponsible kids who won’t be able to hold down a job - and then go home at night, done.
Also, obviously, other thoughts of just walking out of the scenery in other ways are crossing my mind, other means of returning to Anonymity in the Great Mystery. Right now, I’m just sitting here wondering how much a lawyer will cost and whether I care enough to hire them.
This whole world is a foreign land
We swallow the moon, but we do not know our own hand
Oh, we're running with the case, but we ain't got the gold
Yet we're trying to leave something behind
My friends, I belive we are at the wrong fight
And I can not read what I did not write
I've been to his house, but the master is gone
Yet we're trying to leave something behind
Now there is a beast who has taken my brain
You can put me to bed, but you can't feel my pain
When the machine has taken the soul from the man
It's time to leave something behind
Oh, money is free but love costs more than our bread
And the ceiling is hard to reach
Oh, the future ahead is already dead
And it's time to leave something behind
from TO LEAVE SOMETHING BEHIND
by Sean Rowe (The Accountant Soundtrack)
2016
25-26 April 2025
Gershom
Richard Van Ingram