There's no better circuit than the short circuit, no better route than that which roots, no better way to move than under one's own steam, with the whole power of the cosmos behind you...
Whenever I lived abroad - in 13 countries thus far - as a teacher of English (at least that's what they thought I was teaching!), I always started off (when I settled in to my accommodations) by making a route for jogging, or several routes in and around where I lived. I recall in Warsaw, jogging through pine groves and allotment gardens, the great Russian Cemetery and beneath massive rookeries. I always the best thing for any creature when finally wrested from their slumber was, not a cup of coffee (such headshots first thing in the morning surely bode no good) but a little vigorous exercise. To be sure, I love my coffee, but I also love the natural 'coffee' of one's own vital engines.
Here, in Glasgow, those engines are in constant use, and the routes I have uncovered here around the shires and the valley over the past decade or so, are worth their weight in gold. Indeed, the other day I looked at one of my maps on which I had scored some of those routes, and it resembled a pot-bound plant, albeit in two dimensions. It's then I realized that these 'routes' (under one's own steam) are actually roots (sometimes the English language delights in delighting you with its happy coincidences), that embed you deeper and more intimately into place, and by extension, into the planet as a whole.
At any rate, I was curious as to the coincidence between the short circuit (route) and the electrical variety that is defined as....
a connection between two nodes that forces them to be at the same voltage. In an 'ideal' short circuit, this means there is no resistance and thus no voltage drop across the connection. In real circuits, the result is a connection with almost no resistance. In such a case, the current is limited only by the resistance of the rest of the circuit.
And then there is Zizek's take:
A short circuit occurs when there is a faulty connection in the network– faulty, of course, from the stanpoint of the network’s smooth functioning. Is not the shock of short-circuiting, therefore, one of the best metaphors for a critical reading?
He continues:
Is not one of the most effective critical procedures to cross wires that do not usually touch: to take a major classic (text, author, notion), and read it in a short-circuiting way, through the lens of a “minor” author, text, or conceptual apparatus (“minor” should be understood here in Deleuze’s sense: not “of lesser quality,” but marginalized, disavowed by the hegemonic ideology, or dealing with a “lower,” less dignified topic)? If the minor reference is well chosen, such a procedure can lead to insights which completely shatter and undermine our common perceptions.
By using the (minor) lens of Nature to short circuit the reading of civilization and society, I can learn to breathe and be naturally. I can also begin to see the system, as I analyze and contemplate the whole. Indeed, this may well be the most accurate way of describing the essence of my hill-walking-cycling of the past decade: short-circuiting the circuit (the circuit being the circus of civilization).
Oh, how I have learned to breathe as a result!
So, next time you're thinking of going to the hamster-mill, take a look outside, around you, at the nature, the ponds and parks and quiet little groves.... Take a vigorous walk, or even stumble into a jog, but feel free to pause (fluency is all about the pausing) and inhale the scenery, maybe even talk to the squirrels and starlings....
No comments:
Post a Comment