Etalkinghead

Benito Bangalotti says “AIM (AOL instant messaging) is terrible. I only use it as an information briefing type of thing.”

AOL instant messaging is a time-tested software that allows real-time interaction, typewritten interaction, between individuals displaced by walls, air, age, chill, heat, clothes, marital status, sexuality, venereal diseases, wallet, time, space, insecurities, inhibitions, and nearly every other aspect that impinges upon life an existential inconvenience: a metaphysical itch.

Through AIM the micro headaches, sprains, tumors, euphorias, uncertainties, glories, romances, and fantasies acquire a tangibility: typing at the speed of instinct, typing at the rate of intuition per minute, typing with the sweat of anticipation: smileys: :-), :-(, :-\, :-* giving a profound and compelling psychological dimension, wedging open the portal of perception, man interacting with man, machine accelerating consciousness, events, outcomes, and feelings: screwing stuff up and sewing them back together at the tap of a key. Not everyone’s an ace though. Sometimes, as Benito Bangalotti observes, it is “weird”, “awkward”. He asks, “Are you this candid with everyone?” Benito my friend: that for your sake and mine has to be rhetorical question. The answer, naturally, is yes.

Naturally. Naturally? Or is it, Naturally followed by a semicolon and then Naturally?

Nature: the source of all that which is qualitative: The quality of the sun and the moon, the dark and the day, pepsi and coke, buffets and a la carte. Nature is the study of contrasts; a study that finds a conclusion, a reaction, to contrast. When the edible is eaten it is a plus, when it is excreted it is a minus. Digestion is natural.

Then why isn’t it natural for Benito Bangalotti to type out his heart, to communicate; why is AIM “an information briefing thing”; and why is it that it is natural for me to be candid, to not find interaction at any dimension awkward, weird, or the attitude in and of itself fucked up?

Well, let’s put it this way, very naturally: let’s connect life and abandon the concept of all mediums. There is a psychology involved in all interactions; each object, each tool, is a psychology. Benito Bangalotti interjects: “shut up. I’m not feeling very metaphysical or whatever the hell you are suggesting.”

Naturally, I go on, “The object’s existence compels it to be a medium-because there must be a dialogue between the object and the beholder for the act of mutual coexistence to be consummated. Let’s hear with our noses, let’s eat with our eyes, let’s taste with our ears. Let’s “talk” on AIM. Let’s connect life.”

Benito Bangalotti grumbles, “I just really can’t get into a conversation on AIM, it deletes everything good about a talk in person.” I suggest “That’s where intuition comes in. Each word typed implies a thinking pattern, each thinking pattern, a feeling; it’s music, really, naturally. When you can intuit that through words, you’d love AIM as well as life.”

Benito pauses for a minute, fully candid, and a quarter helpless, and then he adds: “I don’t know anything about you and I’m not skilled enough to ascertain the info from your writing style. It can be taken on too many different levels.”

I say, “So then, there’s little danger in this being a bad practice.” Benito ignores the remark, and goes on, “..not only what you are saying, but how and why….there’s a few different games going on simultaneously.”

“Of course. Except these ‘games’ are what keeps life so vested in. How we thrive on what we can do, and how we mourn what we cannot. For instance Benito, I am thriving currently, and you are mourning the fact that you are not ‘skilled enough’. I am thriving, you are mourning. I don’t believe in duality, as I believe in unity. So ideally and in fact, naturally , there’s no reason you should be mourning. You have every right and capacity to thrive. If you find that, the journey in its many forms, weird and awkward, then you won’t. Everything is connected.”

“You’re right…except you’re assuming it’s not possible to be in both a thriving and mourning state simultaneously” says Benito. He warns, “My personality is multi-faceted, Roy. Don’t judge me.”

“I understand. I am not judging. I am merely suggesting that the possible cause of your woes is a constant struggle in duality. You are trapped between dimensions: the substance and essence of your curiosity of your noble yearnings; of your dreams and self-concepts; are trapped- being pulled apart, sheared even, by two tormenting giants, two great camps. Security and Insecurity. Typing in person versus Talking in person. Technology and Biology.”

Benito Bangalotti pauses and articulates a realization: “kind of like a game, a controlled burn.” I reply, “Yes”.

Benito adds, “Thanks Doc, how eloquent.”

In the era of technological Globalization, the entire range of human experiences, walls, air, age, chill, heat, clothes, marital status, sexuality, venereal diseases, time, space, insecurities, inhibitions, and nearly every other aspect that impinges upon life an existential inconvenience: a metaphysical itch, is acquiring a new dimension, creating altered perceptions, enhanced appreciations, forcing equilibrium in a forceful chaos.

AOL instant messaging. Facebook. Myspace. Livejournal. Xanga. Blogs. They all chronicle the soul of the Universal Unconscious, its terrible, grand, efforts, micro efforts and macro revelations. This is the era of Technological Globalization.

Bad? Good? Jaded? I don’t give a fuck? Well, they are all equally valid responses to this new era, this New World Order.

For, in the end mediums don’t matter. It’s all about sincerity. It’s all about naturally.

And guess what? In the unnatural? : There’s plenty fucked up there. Unnatural: that is totally some weird shit. Always been. Still is. Don’t need to be.

Post-Script: Benito Bangalotti observed “i’m pretty sure you’re an agitating fucker…intentionally so…but i think i’d prob take a liking to you because you give me such articulate answers like that.” I replied, “You are on the dot. I love agitating people. It brings out their humanity like nothing else.”.

All is life, and life is all, I am part of life. So what does that make me? A part of all?

Everything is connected.

Everything.