Daily writing exercise, 750words.com
I started. That’s a good place to start. I, that is, me, that is, the person talking to you right now… hang on a minute, sorry. There’s a you, too. I should have mentioned that. I mean, I started is a good place to start, but if it’s a place, there must be non-places, else-wise I would have started everywhere. Indeed, that I started at all indicates that there was a point, and not just an all-the-time. We can go back to that. But, for now, in this vein, what I was getting at was that if there’s an I, there must be at least one non-I, and that would be, ostensibly, you. So, we good? I started. Me, the one telling you this. There’s no other word for you, like there is for I and me. I mean, parts of speech and all that. You does double duty. I can say things, like, I know me, but if you wanted to say that about you, you would have to say, You know you. Which sounds a bit silly. Furthermore: remember when I said we? If I’m not part of the we, but you are, if I want to address all of you, do you know what word I have to use? You again. And just to complete the picture– there’s even another word for we, and it’s us. You and you only get you and, alas you. Which isn’t even fair, because there so many of you! And only one me, only one I. Of course, there might be a whole lot of groups that would use the word we, or us, but, take out the me and or the I, and what’s left? They. I mean, if you aren’t part of them. See? They get another word too! Sure, its an awful lot like they, but still. And even he gets him and she gets her. Know what It gets? Those. Are you insulted yet? Well you must be. I would be. Who invented this stupid thing, language. Want to know my theory? (By the way, just the one My, so we’re all even on that score). My theory is language wasn’t even invented. It just sort of happened. Which seems pretty irresponsible if you ask me. To just let something as seemingly important as language just happen. I mean, I get the deal with DNA and all that, survival of the fittest. Its a great big complicated world, lots of bits and bobs, and who knows what will happen when they interact and their interactions interact and so on and so on to more and more levels of absurdity. Might as well code into the mess a means by which entities can only reproduce if they survive, otherwise you might end up with all kinds of gluts and plug-stops. It actually works sort of smoothly, there’s a beauty to it. There’s an elephant, great big lumbering thing, and it only got that way because where it was, the bits and bobs interacting called for something to become big and lumbering in order to survive long enough to reproduce. But words, what’s smooth about I and Me and She and Her but only the one You? I’ll tell you what, it smacks of philosophy, if you ask me, and nobody wants that. Least of all me. I can’t speak for you, of course, but then I hardly know you. I don’t know you at all, in point of fact. In point of fact, I don’t even know if you exist. I only made you up because I needed a not-I and if there’s one thing I could never know it’s what I’m not. I think. I mean it stands to reason, doesn’t it, that I could only know me. I mean, I could only know what’s before me, what happens to me, through me, because of me, but never despite me. I am, as it were, only capable of observing things from the center of the universe that surrounds me, and, to be frank, if it ain’t in the center, who’s to say where it is. I tried, when I started, to say that, having designated a start I must have declared it to be non-all-the-time and so not-everywhere. But not everywhere? The only place that’s not everywhere is where I am. And you’re not here, are you. No. You could be anywhere. You could even be anywhen! So who am I to say you do or don’t like philosophy.