Three Strange Angels

Rolling stones…

Sisyphus must have known he was buggered the minute he looked at that boulder. The son of kings and a king himself, we can thank Sisyphus for bringing commerce into the world. Surveying the global financial fallout, it’s no small surprise to learn that this mythical Greek was a greedy, lying, niece-fucking son of a bitch. That’s when he wasn’t busy murdering merchants and travelers, stabbing his brother in the back or sticking one in Zeus’ eye.

The swine had it coming to him. So when that massive rock rolled down the hill and landed in front of him, he must have known he was one step closer to hell. Let’s face it, there’s got to be no crueller purgatory than the desperate sweat of shouldering a boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll down again. Never getting to the top of the peak, yet repeating the same trick day in and day out for eternity.

The Sisyphean dilemma sounds like insanity. Despite this most of us willingly shoulder the boulder. Enslaved to a bond; car instalments; medical aid; debt repayments or Edgar’s six month, interest-free payment plan; we reach for the rock and walk the mountain. Day after day. Month after month. Year after year. This while the sky yawns above us, and a fantasy of freedom beckons on the other side. 

Only the psychotic, illumined or gifted few give up. For the rest it’s the daily grind of pushing our way closer to the top of our failure, while convincing ourselves we are striving for success.

Perhaps the trick is one of perspective?

Which is what makes Albert Camus is the legendary genius he is. In his philosophical essay The Myth of Sisyphus Camus posits: "The struggle itself...is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."

It is only, Camus says, by acknowledging the absurdity or our situation that we can march towards death – shoulder to the boulder - with a smile on our face.

Art by summitstudios at deviantART.

One small single truth

We are born alone. We die alone. Why then do we spend much of our lives seeking union with the other? Is it to emulate the spark of creation? A fusion of binary polarties that for the briefest moment recreates a heaven for travelers far away from home. Born of the product of lovemaking, do we intuitively migrate toward the point of origin? Is it that we fall from oneness into twoness. Fragmented from unity into solitude, and so seek return to that state of familial solidarity? People believe in twin souls or soul mates or an original separation. For them is the need is seeded by longing? There are those who say we begin to create our true definition by breaking our parental mirror to redefine ourselves through the image projected by our lovers' eyes. For them does relation help craft identity? In indigenous lore seeking our antithesis simply means following the path of the original story. Emulating the birth of the cosmos again and again as yin meets yang. Or perhaps when we are truly alone we face the startling truth. We are borne of nothing, and die only to return to nothing. An emptiness so overwhelming that once alienated from it, we grasp onto anyone to avoid going back. For me the truth is this. We are borne of one into two, the sum of which makes three. A trinity of doing, saying and being that makes us more and less than we already are.

Cup half empty

When I was twelve I wanted breasts. More than anything. A boyfriend. My first French kiss. A fresh white bread sarmie loaded with chocolate spread. A new puppy. The ability to read my father’s stash of erotica cover to cover.

Just a bud. Or an ache beyond my nipple that would herald a promise of bigger things to come. But zilch. Nothing. Zip. Zero. I was flatter than a long drive through the Karoo. My school uniform hung on my scrawny body from shoulder to knee without a curve. My mother bought big, or I was given my sister’s hand-me-downs, so I looked like a knitting needle holding up a cotton hankie.

Then there was the sister. She of the generous breasts. The B cup. The storm in a push up, lacy, dove knotted, daisy chained pastel number. Her uniform stretched over her ample form, gaping slightly between the buttons to reveal a hint of chiffon, or the lightest hue of blue or pink. I was green. I was livid. I was fuming.

My mother had just taken her off to Woolworths to get new bras when I tagged along and said that I needed one too. “What for?” they both laughed. “You couldn’t even fit into a training bra.” My humiliation was complete. But I would exact my revenge.

With a wry smile I offered to carry the bags in and then ferreted away the prettiest bra in my cupboard. The next day I tried it on. Eeep. They were right. The cups were two empty hands over skin and nipple that revealed little else but a few ribs. “Nothing a couple of socks won’t fix,” I thought.

Without looking in the mirror I rushed the socks into the bra under my uniform before anyone could leave the breakfast table. Then I rushed out and onto my bike and sped off to school. God I felt like the queen of the world as I parked my bike and strode toward the class, every eye upon me.

Instead of inspiring lust, particularly in a young blonde immigrant from Italy called Angelo, I was greeted by howls of laughter. It appears that in bras, socks are lumpy and make even young Goddesses look bumpy.

“Fuck” I said out loud for the very first time in my life. Despite the square, frumpy state of my breasts it made me feel better. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” I said with emphasis again and again striding to the bathroom as if I didn’t have a care in the world.

Jealousy is a hell of a thing. Psychologists say that it is a complex emotion and comes from a Greek word which means to boil or ferment. Part anger, part possession, part passion, I discovered that jealousy is as vivid and long lasting as the memory of a pastel green bra with a bright orange dove sewn between two empty cups.