The Nutty Nut and the Wild Slut (5)
The Third Act
The telephone stops ringing, and a long silence follows. Then WS re-enters, carrying a tray with a loaf of bread, a cup of olives, and an big bread knife.
NN: That took a long time. At least it seemed to me that way.
WS: Were you afraid I wouldn’t come back?
NN: I didn’t know what to expect.
WS: And does not knowing what to expect make you feel uncomfortable? I bet it does.
NN: Can you please wipe that lipstick off my face? And undo these handcuffs? I am not sure I still like the game you are playing with me.
WS: You are not sure you still like this game?
WS slowly takes out a handkerchief and softly wipes the lipstick from his face. She uses some spit, the way a mother sometimes does if she wants to quickly clean up the face of her child, when no water and soap are available. Then she removes the lipstick from her own lips and starts to stroke his hair and gently kiss him on the face, stopping occasionally to look at him very tenderly.
WS: Are you sure you dislike this game? What makes you so sure?
Silence. She very gently puts her hands on his face to caress him, and she smiles at him. She strokes him softly on the chest.
NN: I am not sure about anything anymore. I like the way you are looking at me now. There is tenderness in your eyes. It confuses me.
WS: What confuses you?
NN: Like I do not deserve your tenderness. I thought you were mad at me, wanted to humiliate me. Why did you take that snapshot?
WS: I don’t know. To provoke you a bit?
NN: But why? You know, it would be very unfair.
WS: Who is talking about fairness?
NN: Putting me in this position is not fair.
WS: You did put yourself in this position. And now you have regrets. This is a thing that happens a lot. It happens to men. It happens to women. All the time.
NN: I did not agree to my picture being taken.
WS: But you do like to connect with me, with me as a woman. We can take another picture, of the two of us together. Would you like that better?
NN: I don’t want any picture, with me on it, in this situation.
WS: (She looks deeply into his eyes, then kisses him tenderly on the mouth.) What is it that you dislike about this situation?
NN: You confuse me. You keep confusing me.
WS: We have drunk the holy wine. Now let us eat the sacred bread together. (She cuts two slices from the bread and butters them.) Freshly baked. By me. For us. For communion. (She starts to feed him pieces of the bread.) Take and eat, this is my body. (She eats a piece of the bread herself, too.)
NN: What ritual is this?
WS: Don’t know. Never did it before. If you do something for the first time, how can it be a ritual? How do you like my body?
NN: The bread? Very tasty and fresh, thank you.
WS: Hmm. Not what I meant.
She slowly gets up, does a sensual stretch of her whole body, and makes a full turn.
NN: You are attractive. Very attractive.
WS: Attractive? What does that mean? Does it mean that I turn you on?
NN: Tasty and fresh.
WS: You didn’t taste me yet. You tasted nothing, yet. Here, let me feed you an olive. (She takes an olive, licks it, then puts it slowly into his mouth.)
NN: Hmm. Stuffed. I like it. And I like the stuffing.
WS: The stuffing is tasty, eh?
She feeds him another olive, looking intently at him. She feeds him a few more. He is eating them eagerly. Silence. They smile at each other. Then she suddenly drops her smile, gets up and takes up the bread knife.
WS: Did you know that women sometimes dream of revenge? Violated women. Ultimate revenge.
NN: Humiliate us?
WS: No, cut your balls off.
She gestures with the knife.
NN: I don’t think this is funny.
WS: Who is talking about fun? I was talking about revenge fantasies that some of us have. You know, capture a man who has raped you, drug him, and then use the knife (she gestures) and castrate him. Cut out the nutty nuts that some men do not deserve to have.
NN: Well, you haven’t drugged me yet.
WS: You don’t know what was in the stuffing, or do you?
NN: WHAT?
WS: Just joking. (Pause.) You didn’t rape me, so I will let you keep your balls.
She puts the knife down. There is a long uneasy silence.
WS: But we have to talk seriously, about serious matters. We have to talk about you and Fiona a bit more. Why did you do it?
NN: Do what?
WS: Why did you choose to have an affair with her?
NN: I already told you. Because I could not resist.
WS: Could not resist? So you are not a mature man?
NN: What do you mean, not mature?
WS: There are only three phases of a man. Or a woman, for that matter. Unripe, ripe, and rotten. Rotten you are not. I can sense that you try to be decent. But you are not mature, either. A mature man would have been able to stave off a seduction attack by an immature woman.
NN: An attack? Why is it immature for a healthy male and a healthy female to feel the pull of desire?
WS: The pull of desire. You make it sound like gravity. Male object cannot fail to fall towards attractive female object. Apple pulled by the force. Adam lured by Eve. And he has to yield.
NN: The fall from Paradise. What does that have to do with sexual attraction?
WS: Paradise was lost because self consciousness confused the first humans. We have to find out how Paradise can be regained.
NN: The new Paradise. With or without sexual attraction?
WS: The gender polarity attracts and repels. Always, I guess.
NN: The pull of sexual gravity. I cannot deny that I feel it.
WS: But that does not mean you are helpless. You are not a victim. You are not an object, John.
NN: No, I was her teacher.
WS: A woman with daddy issues feels attracted to her daddylike professor. Looking for a father figure. Pleasing him. Beckoning him. Pulling him towards her with an ambiguous promise of sex. She cannot sense that the child-parent pattern is inappropriate. He does not sense it either. She cannot sense that she is an adult woman, and that there are adult ways to relate to adult men.
NN: We were consenting adults, both wanting sex. And she initiated.
WS: OK, there was nothing wrong, then. Such a relief. How did it go on?
NN: She did give herself completely. It felt like heaven, at first. We experienced deep connection, emotionally, physically. What we went though together was marvellous. Like a dream. We went deeper and deeper. Together. We didn’t even care if others knew about us. I am almost sure my wife knew, too. But we avoided the topic. Preferred to keep up appearances, my wife.
WS: So you kept quiet, too. But the affair continued.
NN: And went on, for several months. And then it changed. Gradually. Fiona wanted me to change. Tried to persuade me to become some sort of activist. Insisted that we are living in exceptional times. That pursuing a regular career as a scientist was inappropriate.
WS: Well, are these ordinary times? Or exceptional times?
NN: From the advent of science, the beginning of the industrial revolution, people have believed we are living in exceptional times. I am no exception.
WS: What do you believe, deep in your heart? Do you believe she is right? Can you understand, with your heart, what she was trying to say to you?
NN: Yes, I understand it now.
WS: She gave herself to you completely, no strings attached. And you loved it. She wanted to go deep with you. And you indulged in it. But when she insisted on commitment, you backed off. That is how immature men behave.
NN: You make me mad. Do you know that?
WS: Yes, I know that, and I do not give a fuck.
NN: Anyway, it does not matter anymore. She left me. She disappeared. And now that she has gone, I have regrets. For now I know that I truly loved her.
WS: She was your teacher. Better heed her lesson.
Silence.
WS: You are a physicist. What kind of? Which area of physics?
NN: Cosmology. Gravitational collapse. Black holes. Extreme deformations of spacetime. Plasma jets.
WS: Black holes, places in the universe that suck, so that everything disappears. Even light. No escape. Like hell, really.
NN: You appear well informed.
WS: About hell? Yes, I know a thing or two.
NN: About black holes, the universe.
WS: I am not all that interested in what science has to say about the universe. After I dropped out of science, I have become a practical girl.
NN: Yes, I have heard that. Science should be practical. Or, science should shut up. We don’t want to hear what science has to say, for science was created by white privileged males.
WS: Disconnected eggheads. Heads without hearts. Brains without balls.
NN: This world is a madhouse. But what can I do?
WS: Well, I guess the best thing for you is carry on with your career. Bury yourself in your work. Neglect your family. Keep up appearances with your wife. Enjoy your privileges. Your academic honours. Your trips to conferences in exotic places, paid for by your university. The occasional romantic affair with a colleague or student. What a full life!
NN: It was a great privilege for me to learn physics. I was very lucky to have had great teachers. When I was a student I was keenly aware of my good fortune. Physics is our best attempt to understand the work of God. What our best minds have to say about how it all came about.
WS: How it all came about. And how does it help you, now?
NN: For a long time, it gave me a sense of understanding. But now I feel lost. I feel I lost hope. I have become keenly aware that we, me and my fellow scientists, do not act on our beliefs. Almost all of us believe that we are at a turning point. That time is running out. That it is urgent for us to change.
WS: But you don’t act on it.
NN: No, we don’t. We all act as if we believe that our scientific careers are the most important things in the world.
WS: So your world is a madhouse, too.
NN: We made a mess. We are a mess. Who is responsible? Never us. Always they. Because we are rational. We have trained ourselves. We train the brightest young minds we can find. Train them to become just like us. Brilliant. Unravelling the secrets of the universe. Glorifying in our knowledge.
WS: Brilliance is not enough. Brilliance has made us arrogant. We have to relearn to be humble.
NN: We believed that the earth could be conquered, dominated. We deceived ourselves.
WS: And deceived others.
NN: What can we do now? Right now, we are consuming the last rays of ancient sunlight. Most of us are not even aware of what is going on. Is there a solution?
WS: I don’t know. We have to find the way back to Paradise.
NN: Paradise is everything that this earth is not. If you are looking for Paradise, you may have picked the wrong planet.
WS: This planet is old and wise. This lady will survive. Maybe we are still in time to learn from her. At last.
NN: But how?
WS: By letting ourselves be touched by her beauty. By her vulnerability. By the scars we have made in her. Give up the impulse to dominate her. Men have to give that up.
NN: Why always the men? Are women any better than men?
WS: The impulse to dominate. The need to control. There is so much we cannot control.
NN: Scientists are aware of that, mostly.
WS: But have neglected to make that clear to the rest of the world.
NN: We created the illusion that science can solve all problems. That technology can fix what greed and ignorance have broken.
WS: Ignorance, we can cure. Greed, we can stop.
NN: How to cure ignorance? I cannot. The ignorance of the lay world, the stupidity of the politicians, the greed of those who accumulate wealth. It scares me. I cannot face it.
WS: First face it in yourself.
NN: If I look at myself, I get lost. The ironic distance from the world that most of my colleagues cultivate. It does not work for me. Not anymore. It makes me feel cold and disconnected. But there seems to be nothing better.
WS: You are almost ripe, almost good for the picking. Almost ready to act like a man. Behave like a man. Stand up. Speak up. Let the Spirit move you to do what is right, for you. Fight for what you believe in.
NN: Sometimes I discuss the ills of the world with colleagues. We agree that there are obvious solutions, at least to some of the problems. Drive less, walk more. Eat oatmeal, not meat. Large parts of the western world have lived on oatmeal for centuries.
WS: Only because they had to.
NN: The cheap energy is running out. Those times will be back.
WS: Are you surprised that people do not want to hear such prophecies?
NN: It doesn’t matter. Sensible solutions still exist. Well, maybe. But people do not want to hear. Do you really want people to drive less? Then for Chrissake make the fuel more expensive. Way more expensive. All fuel, for everyone. That will work, surely. And it is the only thing that will work. But people do not want to hear this. So no politician will say it.
WS: Speaking truth that is unwelcome, you can learn. Just practice with me.
NN: It does not make sense for a physicist to get involved in politics. In politics, I am just as dumb as the next man.
WS: Has it occurred to you that scientists may have to develop other qualities in themselves, before they can become effective?
NN: Other qualities?
WS: Heart. Guts. Balls for the men, clit for the women. Just brains is never enough. Has never been enough.
NN: Why us? Why the scientists?
WS: Because you are supposed to be the best and the brightest, God damn. You consider yourselves elite. With all the privileges. Well, start acting as such. Take your responsibilities, for the sake of the world. Noblesse oblige.
Long silence
NN: Not long ago I saw a little girl in the train, just a brief encounter. She must have been around eight years old, and she was with an adult that she paid no attention to, nor vice versa. They sat opposite to me. Then, when she looked at me, she made me shiver. She looked through me like a vulture, without blinking. She saw me as prey.
WS: Sometimes, when people look like that, you can sense that there is a me in them, but no recognition of a you. What did you do?
NN: It was an experience that made my blood run cold. I got up and sat in another compartment.
WS: My guess it that she was being abused. Maybe the adult that was her companion was her abuser.
NN: I would have no idea.
WS: She will need a miracle to heal her. You could have been that miracle, but you fled the scene. Like you fled the scene with Fiona.
NN: Me? I could sense that she was going to cause misery without end to those around her. I did not want to have anything to do with it. With her.
WS: We are all connected, you know. By leaving the scene, you broke that connection. Your choice.
NN: That is ridiculous. I was not responsible.
WS: She needs a life event that jolts her. An event that transforms her into a magnificent fearless woman.
NN: There are women that make men miserable.
WS: And there are men that make women miserable.
NN: Well, I am not one of them.
WS: By making themselves unavailable to their families. By keeping up appearances with their wives. By being absorbed in their careers. By starting affairs that disrupt lives. By not being present where they are needed.
NN: (Shouting.) I have had enough!
WS: You want to drop out of class? Now? We were only just beginning.
NN: I do not have to take your bullshit, you know. I don’t want any more of it.
WS: Contacting me was your decision. But we can stop this any time.
NN: I want to go.
WS: We all decide for ourselves when we are ready.
NN: Ready for what?
WS: Ready to be fully present. Ready to experience. The churning, the brewing, the mixing, the blending. The concocting of the transforming potion. The pouring out, the drinking of it. Ready to take our cup in our own hands. Ready to partake of the intoxicating brew in which good and evil are mixed. Ready to engage in the discourse between man, woman, and the devil. Ready to dance the ecstatic dance of life.
NN: Please give me a break.
WS: To be present in the body, fully present. To experience the tension between inside and outside, really sense it. Be that tension. Endure it. Feel the sweet opposition of masculine and feminine. Participate in the push and pull. Taste the magnificence of penetration and surrender. Be present in that field where we can be together. The field of abandon, the glorious field where we can transcend, together, the eternal battle between good and evil.
NN: I am not ready. Not ready for all this. Things I do not understand.
WS: You are opting out? You don’t want to know about all this? About paradise and the devil?
NN: Not right now. You scare me. I have to go.
She unlocks the handcuffs. He gets off the bed. He looks around, looks at her for a long time, as if undecided what to do. Then he slowly walks to the door and leaves the room. Long silence. WS puts on trance music that gets louder and louder. She starts to dance an ecstatic dance.