'The Clock', by Fernando Ruiz
Art by Karolina Grabowska
The incessant barking of a pack of dogs – about 10 or 11 of them – served as my alarm clock. My narcissist roommate collected dogs. He probably loved the attention, loyalty, and unconditional love they offer. For me, it was hell to wake up to an angry pack of Chihuahuas, Labradors and Poodles barking persistently as if to remind us of their right to exist, each with its own distinct vexing cry.
I am currently undergoing my longest existential crisis. Like many, lack of funds results in a lack of psychological diagnosis and treatment. Hence, I’m forced to call my condition an existential crisis. Today I’ve been wondering about what I’m doing, practically speaking.
“Why are you here instead of where ‘ya belong?” asked my roommate.
“Where I belong? Where’s that?” I responded, half-asleep at 11 a.m.
“Oh, you know, doing one of those jobs people from your neighborhood ended up doing.”
“Shit. What kinda question is that? Are you some kind of asshole? What is that girl of yours doing to that brain of yours?”
My tiny crisis of magnificent proportions kept raging, as it did. It came in waves and I had come to enjoy its rhythmic ebbs and flows as certain moments afforded at least a tiny escape from the questioning and the truth-searching and the viewing-in-the-mirror.
“Where do I belong?” I asked myself during my shift at Walmart that day.
As if attempting to justify my life, I sat in the magazine aisle, replete with its lifestyle suggestions – LATE NIGHT SEX MAKE IT HOT, MAKE IT HAPPEN! – FLATTEN YOUR BELLY THE NEW WATER SIPPING TRICK THAT CRUSHES HUNGER – I took out my notepad and began an exercise in automatic writing:
I became a worker to learn how to think with my eyes and hands and legs. After many years, I have learned that the metaphysics and politics of clocks are the key to understanding the modern world, what some call the ruthless capitalist system. The clock is the result of a society at war with leisure, with the pleasure of lived experience understood as the accumulation of joy and pleasure. Clocks are a reminder that every movement signifies death and eternity. As time passes, it becomes a repository of forgotten fossils. Our shoes and beds, our ideas and desires, our ethos and mythos, all turn into dust with the passing of time. Karl Marx wrote: all that is solid melts into air, all that is sacred becomes profane. Hell of a point. Doesn’t time, in it’s mysterious and transfluent nature, shape and rule over our lives? Aren’t we its helpless little creatures as we strive to keep up with the insane demands thrown at us by all kinds of maniacs? The bosses, cops, judges, salesmen, landlords and debt-collectors of the world are all part of the same steaming pile of shit. We work and work and work, begging God to extend the day, the hour, the minute, to keep up with the demands of an insane society ruled over by such maniacs. What I’m saying used to be considered the offspring of insanity. People used to say: “Everyone knows justice and democracy are the pillars of society!” The tables have turned. This society is dying and we all know it. We all have to suffer the consequences of its slow and painful death. Yet, we persist, one way or another. We drag our bodies to the streets, to the underground organizations, to the political meetings, towards the world of permanent revolt. We express our voices everywhere we can, at public parks, packed bars, angry neighborhoods, or the gates of hell: “Brothers, sisters, friends, comrades, and fellow-travelers: the time has come to revolt!”
After who knows how long, I was startled by the disturbingly demanding voice of my manager.
“YOU, BOY, WHAT DAYYA THINK YOU ARE DOING? YOU DON’T GET PAID TO LAY AROUND. TIME IS MONEY, MONEY IS TIME! IF YOU DON’T LIKE THIS JOB, THERE ARE PLENTY OF POOR MEN DYING TO TAKE YOUR PLACE! DON’T YA FORGET THAT. THINK ABOUT THAT WHILE YOU CLOCK OUT, CUZ IM SENDING YOUR ASS HOME FOR THE DAY, NO PAY…”
I smiled, turned around without saying a word, and began following the shining red EXIT sign. I felt heroic and with purpose, it was the first time I felt like a real poet. After all these years of trying to figure out what poetry was, what being a poet was all about. During my walk back home I ruminated about writing a philosophical tract on EXIT signs.