Gap Week: What Could Have Been
26 Jan 2025 - VelikTzar
Words: More than necessary. Time: Better spent someplace else
Hello! I am back!
Some of you may look at the title and feel betrayed. After all, didn’t I promise a post on the history of
Australia, 1930-1939, or what happened between Jack Lang and Robert Menzies coming to power, as it were.
An oft overlooked period of history indeed!
Though if you guessed that accurately, you must have some sort of clairvoyance and supernatural powers that I,
rightly, would fear. This makes my ploy to dupe you and steal your soul a bit hard. After all, I only mentioned going
to the Antipodes. I was to make it because I happened to have spent quite a while looking into that period of Australia’s history for a mod I had been working on for a certain grand strategy game by Paradox Interactive.
Though I don’t think I’ll ever go to Australia in person. I’m not going to a land so hostile to human habitation, where everything seeks to kill me.
Oh, well. This post is clearly not that. I lied. But was it really a lie if I thought it true at the time? I’d say no. In any case, that is what could have been.
It was to be a big post, to be sure, with many words, and proper sourcing. A real post, not some nonsense. But
But. Then personal circumstances made me reconsider. Oh, instead of wreteched Australia we’d have gone to beautiful, fantastical Florence. What happened between Matilda and the Medicis, have you ever wondered?
I was to go to Florence myself, with a dear friend of mine. But, on the same day as last week’s post, on the same day where I and my presentation were judged unworthy, she backed out.
That is understandable, really. If my crush (rather, if I had one, love hadn’t landed on this one’s shoulder in many moons), offered to take me to wondrous Italy, of course I’d be tempted to change plans.
You, however, must understand that the gaping pit of insecurity I call a soul could not handle that. The eternal quetion, what is your worth in the mind of the person on the other side. Other people do not owe you the
same evaluation you give them. But.
And so, my response that I’d have screamt into the void, as it were, was to be a look at that beautiful city,
its government, and so on. There’d have been many images of many lovely pieces of art. And whilst writing I’d have imagined what could have been. What’s with everyone being so busy in February anyway?
But the days were ticking by, and I did not have time for the many sources I had found. I do have a PhD to work on, after all. Plus, the maelstrom of emotions in my heart subsided. I was simply being childish
(this entire exchange occured entirely in my mind, of course.)
And so, as I was on the train, reading a book on ancient Thebes, the post-to-be changed yet again.
This was originally to be a post on an overlooked part of Australia’s history. But then it was to be a post about Florence. And then it was to be about seven-walled Thebes.
But it ended up being none of those things. I am tired, and sick, and so many things bother me. And there is much to read on the city of Heracles and Oedipus. I am doing that now. I am ashamed to admit, I hadn’t read
Hesiod before. But rest assured, I have procured many sources, digital and physical, and next week, what could have been will be.
I am not a professional historian. But the chances of you being one are quite low indeed, considering you are nothing but a figment of my imagination. And you cannot read books or scholarly articles - you have no attention span for that.
If you come back to read what will be, you’ll do so because of your desire to fill your time with a quick read on your phone that feels vaguely educational - akin to an “educational” YouTube video. This way you will
feel better about yourself - you aren’t drooling at the mouth watching TikToks or Reels. No, you are an educated, refined intellectual. But without all the pain. And so we will lie to each other.
But I cannot leave this blog unattended. I cannot miss a post. No, if I miss one week, then the invisible barrier would have been broken. I’ll just as easily miss another, and another. So it is guilt, that most potent of motivators, that brings me here, with fever, and oh-so-many more important things on my mind, at the very end of the week.
So allow me to regale you with the story of a rather entertaining taxi drive that happened upon me recently. A tale of what was, if you will. And I will.
***
It was around 1610, on a Thursday, and I was hurriedly making my way to the parking lot, where I saw my driver. I lamented his swift arrival - I wished to take a picture of the setting sun over one of the
many lakes in the park. But, here he was.
I had ordered a taxi because I spent the morning walking through the wind and rain for an hour in the morning, with hair and face soaked; an experience I did not wish to repeat. Now, I am partly to blame, my outfit was more focused on aesthetics than
on practicality. Though in my defense I was told it’d only be “drizzling”. Well, it was a bit worse than that. My eye hurt for several hours afterward. Ironically enough, the evening sky
was almost perfectly clear - a rarity in that God-forsaken land.
I got in the car. Now, you see, some people can talk to taxi drivers. My grandmother, for example, nearly always has struck conversation quite succesfully. I’m sure even now, were she not bedridden, she’d be as
talkative as usual. Me, I’m not that kind of person - one of my great moral failings. Every time I try, and after the first minute there is that awkward silence.
So I started off, introducing myself. I was afraid I had made the wrong first impression - as I said, I was dressed quite, dare I say, nice. My supervisor had told me that “people here don’t like it when you dress fancy”, and when I inquired about the dress code for an event, he replied “I don’t know about you, but people here only wear a tie on weddings and funerals”. I won’t go to the former, and pray I don’t have to go to the latter. But, I introduced myself, offering a gloved hand. The taxi driver answered in turn. His name was Mr. T. F. He was a rotund man, with a plump, red face, wrinkled like his hands. They were thick, and short-fingered, more like bear paws.
than anything else.
After he complained a bit about the traffic, the dreadful silence starting rearing its ugly head. I could not have that.
We were stuck in a traffic jam, and we were on the downward slope of a hill. On the horizon, there was the sunset, and in its pink glow I could see clouds appearing, right there, on the very edge.
I tried making a clever remark about how we are in the calm before the storm, and that the setting sun heralded the coming of said storm from the west. To this T. F. simply replied “Yeah, that’s west”.
I do not wish for you to misinterpret this as me making fun of this man. No, as you’ll find out, he was a true superman, the ideal Renaissance polymath, not a soft intellectual, but a true genius, autochthonous to this land at the edge of the world. In this instance, I rather blame my lack of command of the spoken word (worse than my lack of command of the written word, if the Reader can believe that). And in any case, T.F. is no doubt a practical man.
But the sunset was beautiful. Looking at it warmed my heart, even as I felt trapped in that traffic jam. No doubt the people around us were trying to flee from the storm to come as well. For all his technologies and all his power, how pathetic does Man seem before the wrath of Nature.
It was here that T.F. started showing his vast pool of knowledge. He said that if one looked west, from the coast, on a clear day they could see the Tits (he then started laughing, which I forgot to mention - he looked like quite the jolly man. I cannot describe why, but you understand, it’s a feeling.). When I, in my ignorance, asked what he meant, he said “There is the sea, than land, than two bumps (making a gesture with his hand), than land and the sea again”. He was describing the Isle of Man! Geography was thus the first field in which he’d show proficiency. I wanted to let him talk further, so passed the ball back to his court by saying I’d like to go see it one day. “There’s nothing there, why’d you do that” - a practical man, indeed.
I never knew the Isle of Man could be seen from there. I, in fact, have no interest in going. But I had to avoid the silence.
Then our conversation shifted to the weather, as is tradition. After agreeing that where we were was a land forsaken by God (during which he remarked that this was having a negative effect on people’s mental health (“Depression!”)), I asked him where he’d like to live instead. After going through the south of France, he finally settled on “Spain, though they are going a bit bolsh” - this was the start of him imparting his vast knowledge of politics upon yours truly. I happen to not be particularly versed in Spanish politics, so, to allow him to keep talking, and avoid appearing foolish before Mr. T. F., quickly made a remark based on my personal experiences there (I have had the fortune of staying in Costa del Sol for a couple months in my childhood). “They’re going crazy” - he responded. Very hostile to tourists - and without us there’d be nothing there (I am paraphrazing slightly, thus the lack of quotation marks). “We British people should rise up, and go somewhere else. It’s just that it’s tradition, us going to Spain on holiday”.
I have no doubt he is a man to respect tradition. Though I have to say although there (or here, I go back-and-forth like a ping-pong ball) it is dull and dreary, and I myself am always cold and weary, I’d not wish to endure a summer in the south of Spain. When rain is nothing but a dream. And if it does come, it brings with it the desert sands of the Sahara. I’ll admit - heat drives me insane. You can (usually) wear more clothes to endure the cold. Even if you go stark naked, it can be too hot. What do you do then? (My desire to rip my skin apart is probably not the correct choice). The fact I quite hate revealing more of my skin doesn’t help either - not because of fear of the sun, or anything else, I just don’t like the sight of it in a mirror. Thus I end up overdressed in summers - short sleeves and anything showing my legs is out of the question. My best friend (from aborted Florence journey fame) is the opposite - she takes every opportunity to wear shorts and the like, even in the dead of winter. But we can’t all be blessed with her physique. How does she do it? A question asked since the dawn of time. You cannot do it. You are reminded of that time there was a woman at the airport, at 5AM, with a perfect face full of make-up, in a lovely long black dress, the sound of her stilletos heralding her presence. Long, luscious black hair flowed to her waist. How did she do it? You, regretably, were in your “Travel” track suit - looking quite disheveled, as did everyone else. She was unburdened by any luggage - just a black Yves Saint Laurent handbag. It’d have felt wrong if she had had to lug a massive suitcase - how removed she seemed from the banalities, miseries and, frankly, ugliness of your everyday life. Was she even real, and not a figment of a sleepless night? Does it matter? I think not. Oh, sorry, back to our taxi driver.
He, a practical, working man, had far more important things to worry about than appearance, no doubt. Not that he was unkempt - but no doubt he’d have decried my thoughts as useless vanity, excessive and decadent. Cato the Elder come again, probably. Though that is not to say he was blind to appearances - he showed his keen interest in ethnography soon after. “You look positively Middle Eastern” - he said. I had never heard that before, admittedly. One time in high school my art teacher said I had an “Asian face” - whatever that meant. But, again, there was no malice in T. F.’s characterization - he later remarked that he loved all cultures, loved learning about new cultures, talking to people of other cultures. “You can talk to many people with your job” - I replied. He told me he loved Africans - “south, west, east, north - all of them”. “Algerians - we got them here”. What a curious, inquisitve man! A shining example of xenophilia ineed. In that, perhaps, he differs from the stern Romans of yore.
Forgive me, dear Reader, my throat and fever are killing me. I had thought of many things to say, many things, but they’re all gone now. Such is my plight, not just here - how many great thoughts have I had, to be gone forever. I try to reach them and cannot. I can tell you, I’d have spoken to you of 3rd person, and of ecstasy. But I don’t know how the ideas would have been tied together. I know they’re right there! If only I could pierce the veil.
But this Cicero, this Tacitus, his interests were even more numerous! We got on the topic of history. “Crassius” - he said - “Crassius was a Roman general”. Now, you, dear Reader, like me then, are likely to be confused. Does he mean Crassus or Cassius? But do not be too judgemental on our hero - he was driving whilst talking to me. I can’t even drive when fully focused on the road - in fact, my exam ended with me crying on the curb. Surely we can cut Mr. T. F. some slack. He later clarified after I asked “Crassus, we call him Crassius”. I felt bad for questioning his knowledge - I am, at best, a dilettante in regards to history. Thank God I embarked on that taxi journey - I learnt another theory on Crassus’ death - that he was impaled on a stake “through his arse”. I had heard the common myth of pouring molten gold down his throat, but not that one. He said it with such authority I did not even think about asking for a source.
It turned out that the street I was staying was the same street he was born on. The house having been demolished long ago (“I don’t care for it” - he responded when I offered my regrets. A practical man indeed). I cannot imagine my ancestral home being demolished. But in a way it already has been - the renovations have changed a lot. It is not just me and my grandmother there now either. And we aren’t the same. The house stands, but it feels foreign. So much has been lost. And the past can never be again. Is this not the same as what poor T.F.’s house suffered?
We again got to the topic of politics. It is clearly one of his strengths. He said that “we love other cultures, we can adapt, that is how we created the Empire”. What an Empire it was! I let him talk - I am not capable of conversing on the same level, I fear. “This government ruined it” - were some of his final words to me. I timidly said something about the falling pound (I remember how strong it was in my childhood). And then I got off. And our lovely conversation was over. Such a shame. I wished we had more time. Or even better, two pints and a roaring fire. I’m sure then he’d be in his element.
I watched from the living room as the sun fully set. The only light in the dark blue sky was Lucifer herself.
My vision’s been getting worse, you see. I can’t read as far as I was able to. I can’t see faces as far as I was able to. Lights are getting blurred. Will one day my vision be so bad that I won’t be able to see the setting sun? How would I perceive the world then. It seems unimaginable. My grandmother’s vision is extremely bad now - she can barely read with the strongest glasses possible. How scary that seems - what would I be without being able to read? I cannot imagine life like that. I cannot imagine how my grandmother must feel. How her strength has been brought down, she who has never shirked from labor and who has taught me so much.
It is such a great shame that the human body so easily fails us. It seems unworthy for our great spirit. A poor vessel. Frail. Brought down in the misery of old age. How would my pride handle that, requiring help for everything and anything? How would it feel, no longer feeling the stregnth in my limbs, and being afraid for what comes next.
If we have to die, could we not be young until the end? Why, God, why do you have to bring us so low?
I wonder if Mr. T. F. worries about these things. Does he look in the mirror, and remember his face long ago, free of the weariness of age? Does he look at his hands and remember what they were capable of? Does he remember what was, and what will never be again? Does he reminisce about his lost youth? Does he feel his ever more limited time slipping like sand through his fingers?
No, he wouldn’t. Mr. T. F. is a practical man, after all.
***
Several days later, I am far-away from Mr. T. F. and I am sick. I cannot think straight. The clock is ticking. There is work to do.