The one that means most to me is A Fishing Line. Here's some thoughts about the history and presence of that story.
Recently, while wandering round the (rather too) many places I have left digital footprints of my creativity, I couldn’t find A Fishing Line - ‘the’ story of my life. So off it was to hard drive ‘heaven/hell’And so, why not give a history of A Fishing Line – compiled while waiting for ‘search’ to do its thing. I first heard a version of this story (quite unlike my own version) parked outside a hotel in Glasgow, told by a friend who had heard it in Kenya. This was about 1996 or 7. Maybe 1998. The earliest evidence I have of my version is from August 1998 when I wrote it up as a synopsis for a short film. This is really odd, because it was (at this point) set in Cuba and I didn’t go to Cuba till April 1999. My memory tells me I wrote the Fishing line script as a response to my Cuba trip. But clearly not so. Clearly my memory bank is no longer to be trusted. In my computer archives found examples/versions from August 1998, then 2002, then 2010, 2011 and 2017. When I first wrote it as a short story rather than a filmscript is unclear. It hasn’t changed much over the years in short story form. In 2010 I included A Fishing Line as an appendix to ‘the’ story in the dystopic novel Brand Loyalty. In 2017 the novel Another World is Possible is to a great degree the Fishing Line story played out large in the bigger narrative, during which time I finally gained insight into my ‘experience’ in Cuba in April 1999. More than twenty years on, this story is still ‘the one’ story that makes meaning in and of the world for me. I am intertwined with it and my personal experience and its archetypal nature cannot be separated. It’s still my ‘go to’ explanation for how and why I’ve made most of the choices I’ve made. Yet now it’s about five years since I looked at the words of it. I’ve let go of the words and moved beyond them, but the meaning is still fresh in my mind every day. It’s part of who I am. Thus I’ve let go but still have it ever present. A good example of the Dao paradox. If I have one story to share, this is it. In that sense it is the story of my life. My life is tied into this story. I am and am not that girl. I am and am not that man. And every reader will read themselves into parts of the story – or not. And Zhuangzi writes (many many centuries ago) that one has no need for the fishing line once the fish is caught and no need for the words once the meaning is derived. Thus in August 2022 I’ve put it into cyberspace (again?) so that words and meaning can float around in other waters. If you read the story you may catch the fish. Don’t get hung up on the words – read for meaning – and the meaning will be personal, this is not just a story to read, this is a story that can become a part of who you are. You can download the short story version (from 2010) HERE Or read it online HERE Comments are closed.
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