Thursday, February 08, 2007
"HOW WE LIVE MAKES A DIFFERENCE. If we fall victim to the ideology of apathy we go straight down into that Dante circle of Hell reserved for those ‘who wilfully live in sadness.’ The sad shake of the head, the worldly-wise shrug of the shoulders, what can we do? Answer – everything we can do, big and small, and bring up the kids to do better. There might still be time. I believe in second chances and miracles, whatever the weather, whatever the science. Oh God, give it a go. Who is to say for sure that it’s too late?"from Jeanette Winterson's fabulous monthly write, it ties into my mother the ruffled hen this morning at breakfast.
"look at that!" she says, waving the paper at me. it's a front-page article on the hedonist party people in islamabad (why it made the front page boggles me), complete with a wholly inappropriate photograph of a couple dancing together, their faces censored with STN-style boxes. they're wearing the requisite 'western party clothes' and pressed together, the guy's arms around the girl. the article talks about the use of E and other drugs at parties and all the Bad Things anti-WPBers would have a field day with as markers of Pakistan's steady progress towards becoming a Country of Wanton Fornicators (such a quaintly funny word, that) (and as if the anti-es aren't fornicators themselves, the cheek of it).
"amma, you sound like we're responsible for it," remarks sana wryly, eating toast.
"haan, we aren't fornicators," i chip in, eating toast.
the paper also has a little column inside (much more front-page material if you ask me, more important than partiers in islamabad) about a 22 year old woman who went to a hotel to canoodle with her boyfriend and ended up assaulted and murdered by him (and body thrown out of window also). i'm being very flippant about this all, but amma's point was exactly winterson's: bring up the kids to do better. maybe it isn't quite fair to exhort us to bring up better bachay, it being too late for our parents, or for the gooder lot to try and balance the badder ones out- i mean, it isn't fair that the goods feel compelled to stay thus because they 'should' whilst the bads get to have all the parties (because the bads rarely become goods do they) but the point is the doing: the point is not shrugging your shoulders and going with the flow because you can't help it, you can't do anything about it, you just don't wanna. we must remember to push ourselves to do what needs to be done, what has to be, because our shoulds are so flighty and changeable..willfully living in sadness! what a chord it struck, because we really do allow ourselves to flounder in darknesses we could so easily fling aside were we paying more attention. i'm also quite sure wearing my superman t-shirt today has nothing to do with this renewal of noble feelinks. (stop being flippant youuuuuu)
Mina at 2:18 PM
