A Swarm of Dust Read online

  So why this letter? Why this desire to talk? I don’t know. But the desire is here, I can’t resist it (you would say I’m not responsible for some of my actions). Besides which, something tells me I can’t leave town without letting you know. In that dark world you were the only one who wanted to do something good for me, regardless of the reasons for your inclination. I have decided to go and you are the only one I want to tell. And the only one who might be interested. Of course, by way of thanks for the good deeds with which you wanted to cure the ‘sick’ nature of my inner world, as you called it, it would be fitting for me to remain for some time your guinea pig. In that way two things might happen: you would find confirmation of your supposed truth and I would be cured.

  I don’t believe that’s going to happen, so I’m not staying. You yourself said that theories of the human mind are merely signposts to self-deception and in our case, too, that would be the case. Because you approached my mind with a pre-existing model you would quickly uncover in me many things that confirmed your suppositions and anything that did not, you would overlook. Nowhere can you get it wrong so quickly as with the human mind. I’m convinced that it is unknowable. Besides which, the ‘sickness’ of my inner world would remain. No experiment could cure me. Not even by teaching me about sex. I’ve already experienced such teaching. That was fatal and I’m sure it is the millstone that I cannot shift.’

  The rain stopped. To his right ran a muddy river like a torrent. There was water everywhere. It was getting hot in the carriage, suffocating. People were still blabbering, someone turned on a radio; from it crawled indistinct sounds like worms. The ticket collector came through the door, followed by a cold draught that crept beneath clothes. Then the heat returned, and with it the pressure. The passengers sank into a lethargic absence.

  ‘I spoke about a decision to leave this dark world, but in truth it was not a decision, for a decision is an act of strength. I lost my strength. A decision would only have been possible if I had stayed – leaving is a defeat, as I am well aware! It’s my second year here in the capital and the whole time I have felt a longing to return home. Maybe longing is not the right word, more an urge – wild, bloody. This I know only now, when it has been thrown to the surface. These two years have opened up many possibilities, I could have got used to things, but I didn’t. I thought it was due to my slow, lukewarm nature, but now I know it’s instinctive: I was fighting with the spiders that trapped me in this dark web. For in fact my nature is not slow and lukewarm, but quite the opposite! And all my actions which were condemned as the ‘outbursts of an unbalanced gypsy’ and which you would say I’m not responsible for, were simply a revolt against being swallowed up by the city.

  That fear accompanied me the whole time. Because of it, right from the start I acted in a hostile way to everything around me. That seemed the best defence. When we met, you said that I was tormented by the presence of a person and that this person was my past self. That came like a lighting strike: it seemed so incredible that with your first words you would get straight to the heart of my problem! So I felt no resistance towards you. Hence our acquaintance, which became psychotherapy. From the very beginning, something was driving me back home. And although the ‘me’ from the past was tormenting the present ‘me’, it was becoming stronger, tying my hands, dragging me back, as if that ‘me’, wherever it was, had not settled all its scores. I finally realised that I had to leave, for while that ‘me’ grew inside, the facts were there. Over two years they became clear, and for two years I suppressed them and fled before them, but now they have caught up with me.

  And now I see that there were two processes unfolding inside me. I felt an urge to go back to where I came from, and I resisted this world, so that this place did not completely swallow me up, and at the same time I fought against the realisation that I had to go back, that I had to give in. You would say that my feelings drew me back, while my reason was telling me to stay. But that’s not the case. Both processes were exceptionally emotional: I was being pulled back, lured, but the fear of returning pushed me forward. That fear is still inside me, but the urge is stronger. I think that these parallel, contradictory feelings are fundamental and that they appeared when my problem began.

  I am afraid of things I don’t understand. But at the same time I am strongly drawn to the cause of this fear, because I think it will pass if I uncover the cause. This situation has been repeated in different variations my whole life – flight and return. My reactions always run along this axis and maybe you’re right when you say that I’m not responsible for them, since they happen without the presence of reason, completely spontaneously. My resistance to this dark world is the consequence of my desire to go back. Somewhere in the past the causes of my fear are buried and they drag me back. You wanted to solve the problem by ‘reconstructing the event’. The question is, whether the sex act really is at the heart of my problem. Whether the possible source of the problem is the circumstances in which things happened. You saw yourself that ‘reconstructing the event’ did not bring a solution, and I had sensed that before. If the sexual act was supposedly the cause of my fear of sex, then I have to admit that sex between us was very different from that with my mother. I’ve already told you that with my mother I felt a sense of protection and that feeling was conditional upon her relation to me. My mother always saw me as an unhappy, driven creature whom she had to help, while in her, because of her love and guidance, I found an absolute refuge. When I was gripped by horror upon discovering sex, she wanted to destroy that horror – she wanted to teach me and show me how it was done. When I had intercourse with her, the horror of intercourse was of course present, but in her arms I felt a safety shield and from behind that shield I could get to know that horror, that danger. There was no trace of the pleasure here of which you speak. I know nothing of such pleasure. So from the very beginning, sexuality was conditioned by protection, my mother’s protection.

  And then our relationship took a new turn … my mother’s masochism … I told you about that. With her wish that I physically maltreat her I had to compromise myself for the sake of the relationship, for I loved her endlessly. Thus for me our sexual intercourse was both recognition of horror and the fight against it, as well as gratitude towards her, which expressed itself in concern for her pleasure. I told you that my ideas about sex were very unclear. I didn’t realise I was involved in an incestuous relationship, that my mother was a masochist … I loved and respected Geder because I was convinced that he beat my mother to ensure her pleasure. I experienced only the essence of our relationship, I did not know how it looked from the outside.

  I have to admit, though, that even later, when I learned the names for these things, the relationship did not change. And today it is no different. This emerges when other women appear. The first was Emma, whom I told you about. You differ from her in that you tried to deal with me through reason. That’s why we ended up having sex. That didn’t happen with Emma. With you and her there is no feeling of protection, there is no maternal hand, no safety shield behind which to hide and observe the horror. Here, the horror is right in front of me. I find refuge only with my mother. It’s her fault that I feel resistance to women. This horror in the face of sex I probably won’t be able to describe to you. When I think about it, it all seems so improbable. I understand everything, the theory of sexual intercourse is clear to me and seems simple and mundane – but at the moment the act begins, when I feel I am part of the game, my reason withdraws, my interior world becomes primitive, childish, and fear grabs me by the throat. I can’t describe that horror. Perhaps … imagine that you have put a smooth, cold snake on your breast and it is slithering across you … How would you feel?

  I often feel the urge to grab hold of something, to beat it, to cause suffering. I fear that my giving in to my mother’s masochism has transformed into sadism. I am drawn to her. Our relationship has not ended, it is unresolved – I admit that I am more than ever in its claws! Reason doesn
’t help me, reason even seems stupid and pathetic, reason seems like the alpha and omega of the world from which I am fleeing. In recent days I feel that I am becoming somehow childish, I don’t think as much, but am flooded with sensory impressions. So in reality it is not a decision, it is subservience to inner urges.’

  ‘Although I discovered the reasons for my revolt against the world in which I lived for two years, at moments my ‘attitude to the masses’ as you would call it, surprises and amazes me. The majority of people my age drive themselves towards the highest possible position amongst the masses, yet I do not strive for that. This might lead some to say that I was abnormal. You know that I have acquired quite a number of ‘psychological’ labels, which in addition to asociality have hinted at hypochondria, mental retardation and a social complex. If I was part of the masses, then these labels would hurt me, since I would feel that in their eyes I was at the bottom of the ladder. All these young people studying alongside me and making plans for the future want to achieve one thing: success and a name for themselves. They don’t realise that in the depersonalised masses of the inferior there are no names, no individuality, no freedom. The name they wish to acquire has no connection with individuality and personal freedom, it is just an emission of the collective, an emission of impersonality. That dark world, that mill of collectively depersonalised young people, blunts their passions, moulds them into puppets that dance like the undulating floor of the collective beneath them. They are not aware that their desire for success in the collective is a signpost to self-deception. Those are the words you would use, for it was you that said I wasn’t part of the masses.

  I think that way, too, I haven’t allowed myself to be swallowed up. But there is no heroism involved, for you know that I was saved from ruin by the past – the very thing that in itself may mean ruin on an even greater scale. Maybe we don’t decide at all, but rather possibilities pull us along with them. I don’t believe in conscious decisions – behind every human gesture is a background that is expressively instinctive. As soon as someone is brave enough to abandon their illusions, at the end of every possibility there is something bad, something unpleasant. These young people, these students, these pursuers of success are not brave enough.

  Because I am an outsider, I am responsible only to myself for my actions. But you saw yourself that it is not so. The masses see me as one of their dust particles and claim that I am responsible to them. But the concept of responsibility is so beyond my capacity to understand it, that I don’t even have the courage to discuss it. Yet there is something I can say for certain: the masses change the concept of responsibility in line with their habits, responsibility is directly connected with the tradition – and if we say that someone is not responsible for their actions, we admit that the tradition of the collective has power over them. And that is not the case, as you can see!

  When I slapped that professor, when I pulled the truncheon from the police officer’s hands and beat him until he bled, when I began to shout in the middle of a theatre performance, when I tipped over the shelves in the bookshop, when I threw the plate under the table in the canteen, and so on and so on – you’re familiar with my ‘asocial’ acts – what did the masses see? A violation of their habits: lack of sense of responsibility, mental retardation, a gypsy complex, an undeveloped personality, hypochondria, vandalism, the beginnings of mental illness … You know the labels. We have to answer to the masses for our actions. I am helpless against their demands. If for no other reason, because I am an outsider. Because I am opposed. The masses are convinced that I’m consciously in opposition to them and it never occurs to them that the reason might lie elsewhere.

  Of course, as soon as I joined them and felt remorse for my outbursts, I would get the power to undermine the negative attitude of the masses towards me: I would have adapted to their habits, ‘improved’ myself. Repentance is evidence that a person does not lack a sense of responsibility. But I have never felt the urge to repent. I only know of it in a theoretical kind of way. I don’t apologise for my ‘asocial’ actions, since they were momentary sensory reactions that cannot be grasped with the reason. For I may yet do something else ‘asocial’ tomorrow. Why I began shouting during that theatre performance, so that they had to stop it and throw me out, I simply don’t know. I sat there quietly for a long time and watched with interest, even though theatre seems ineffably theatrical and unreal – and basically unimportant. I prefer to watch the rain falling. But then I was overcome by restlessness, a desire for action, for something wild. The sense of restlessness was unbelievably great, it built up inside me until I felt I would explode … . And I thought I’d jump on one of the audience … At that moment there was a long silence on stage and that silence only increased the unbearable feeling within me … And then it was as if I’d lost consciousness and animal cries emerged from my mouth … Later they told me that the auditorium froze. The lights immediately came on. People thought someone had been killed. Then I was half dragged, half carried out. The police were called … I couldn’t explain myself. Eventually it was ‘discovered’ that I have a cannibal-like relationship to culture and wished to demonstrate that.

  I always said that I didn’t know why I did something, but no one believed me. They planted a purpose on me, found causes, branded me as a troublemaker. To the public, I became ‘that gypsy who yelled in the theatre, that gypsy who beat up the police officer, that gypsy who has a screw loose … ’ and so on – you know that my status is tightly defined. You were the only particle of dust in the collective that wanted to see something different in me; the only one for whom I wasn’t too miniscule to be a guinea pig in an experiment: Psychology … The boundaries of normality … The Hudorovec case …

  But you were open about it. Your experiments didn’t bother me, because you aroused a hope in me that my attitude towards the masses was misguided. Besides which, you were a woman and my desire for women is incredibly great, although my fear of them is even greater. With you, my fear was moderated, perhaps because in you I saw primarily intellect. But as soon as I saw you as a woman, the fear struck back. You are without doubt one of the most noble particles, because you have an independent attitude, but you are nevertheless part of the masses and therefore you are the opposition! I’ve read a number of books about the attraction between men and women – which is also referred to as love – but I see that between us there was nothing like that, neither on your side nor on mine. For you, I was an object of research. That this research was very zealous is shown by the fact that you sacrificed your body, for women do that usually for pleasure.

  I, too, feel no real affection for you, although I don’t analyse this and I seek no clarification of why it is so. Both of us had fairly distinct wishes and it’s completely clear what impulses led to our relationship.’

  ‘I think I’ll leave tomorrow evening. I’ve been thinking about my possible future in this city. And about my future in general: I would no doubt finish my law degree, for it’s not really difficult and, as you said, is only dogma. Then my home municipality, which has given me a scholarship, would probably give me a job at the court. You see, my people are already delighted that everything will turn in their favour and have planned how litigious they’re going to be. The thing I like most about my race is their naivety. It reminds me of virginity, of something genuine. Something that is far from what you call art and culture. Gypsies have no culture. That’s why I think their humanity is less damaged and more effective than the arrogance of this dark society. So, I’d get a job. But I’m not attracted by a job or by the thought of pursuing people through the courts; and because of that study seems barren. That’s how far I’ve dared to think of my future. No further. I considered the possibility that after graduating I would stay in Ljubljana, in the heart of the masses, although outside it, and not return to my province, but that seems even less likely.

  It’s impossible to logically explain why I would quit studying and give up my scholarship at the very mom
ent when I have a chance of becoming what my people call ‘a gentleman’, so I won’t even try. Evidently, every dust particle is convinced that a normal person will not leave the trough and head for some smelly gypsy settlement where he won’t know what to do with himself.

  The main reason I am returning is my mother. Our relationship is a prison, so that staying in this town and aimless studying are both intolerable to me. Utterly intolerable. I’ll breathe a great sigh of relief when I see this town disappearing through the window. My longing to return to my people has a number of unclear nuances – that wind, the smell of the forest, meadows; the stench of our homes, which may seem unbearable to you, is like a refreshing drink to me … and the endless plain that I can see from the hill above the settlement – all these things are like a warm bed to which you retreat when it’s freezing cold. Talks with Geder, with the priest, and with Pišta Baranja when he was still alive, are the metal fastenings of my mind. Exaggerated homesickness, you would say. But it’s not. Because behind it all hides my mother. Homesickness for a vagina? One specific vagina? My attempts to uncover the impulses forcing me home are a barren exercise, I’m aware of that. I don’t know why I’m doing it. It’s your fault, you taught me to feel my way rationally. Maybe I could tell you more, but my desire to speak has faded away … I don’t even know whether I will send you this letter, since it has absolutely no value to you. And at the end of the day, it’s more of a monologue.