Dear Reader, A Word

The following is a story. A tale that could be true - if you're a believer. A parable. A yarn that's not exactly true but real nonetheless. Which is to say -

Dear Reader, A Word

I'm not going to show you something unbelievable to make a believer out of you. I have nothing to prove. Instead, I'm going to tell you something real. Because I have something to say.

*

I observe - People. Events. Actions. Words - and a person who works - Diligently. Faithfully. Well. - fails to achieve what a person who does not work - Diligently. Faithfully. Well. - claims for themself - 

every prize - Won. - like a matador whose sword lunges from their muleta to victory as if to exult - why fight fair?! - when the rules of the fight aren't.

*

The Bull ⋅     It's easy - isn't it - to win a staged fight with a forgone conclusion? 

The President ⋅     That's unfair - a proper festival of feats is an extraordinary exemplar of athleticism - by a bull and a matador. Thus mind you, to disparage a matador is to disparage yourself. Tsk tsk.

The Matador ⋅    Well I agree that the right bull is a fighter, but nobody comes to a bullfight to cheer a cow, no? They come for the triumph of the superior performer against - what is unmistakably - a mere beast.

The Picador ⋅     Would anyone care to hear what I think?

The President, The Matador ⋅    Of course, of course, without a picador there is no spectacle, my friend!

The Picador ⋅     Right. Like one of a hundred sequins on a shiny 'fit, I am both 'indispensable' and invisible as a billable professional.

The President ⋅    No, no, a picador is the first show that beguiles the audience. They are essential - heroically so - But. - 

The Picador ⋅    :eyeroll:

The Matador ⋅    Yes, yes, the right picador sets the mood for a battle of adversaries. It's not the dazzle of a conqueror or the pageantry of a finale, but a first act is very special. 

The President ⋅    - for a splendidly marvelous fiesta, everybody matters - from the carpenters who build magnificent arenas to the hungry who feast on toro de lidia. A bullfight is a dramatic masterpiece; every role is a glorious stroke of brilliant composition. Thus you see, nobody is undervalued or devalued. Tut tut.

The Matador ⋅   Well I agree that nothing is trivial, but top billing is an honor earned in a ring. A picador is a prick but a matador is a killer, no?

The Bull ⋅     I concede that a spectacle is work. But stacking the decks and tipping the scales for an outcome that's calculated to advance neither talent nor merit, to spin a yarn about a 'champion' who 'wins' a canned hunt - that's pretending

there's decency and dignity in a rigged contest.

*

I observe - Officials radiating searing try-hard self-righteousness as they preside. Star performers breathing self-serving self-promotional hot air as they crow. Cogs laboring to be heard above commoditized theater as they spit. - 

while economies of contests, by contests, for contests - pretend not to observe - Officials. Star performers. Cogs. -

every performative triumph of - Justification over what's just. Bullsh!t over who's honest. Noise over what's plain. Pretense over all that's real. -

as if fictions no matter how unbelievable are nevertheless - True. Because. -

everybody is true to their word...

 

Author's Note

We don't believe every narrator... do we?

I mean... the stories we tell!... speak for themselves. Imagine if our testimony had to be honest... if instead of fictions we had to say:

a posture is a performance masquerading as a stand that is neither principled nor scrupulous; a belief is an invention that opines and decides and judges; and a boundary is an ask for respect, that is, to neither trespass nor transgress because trespasses and transgresses are harms.

I mean... to hear the oath-forsworn... what a catastrophe!... neither to guarantee nor safeguard a 'right' to swear false testimony, pshaw.

*

Needless to say... you and I both know... don't we?... a so-called 'right' to violate trust... isn't part and parcel to testifying to something real. As if having something to say... endows a so-called 'right' to be untrue, that is, to our word...

M