Even that word "culture" is fraught with peril. It is a word too often used, and used badly.
And I would not even deny that the ugliness of it all would be endurable if it were not so all-encompassing--if there were for me some real possibility of internal exile.
But, that, precisely is the rub.
Were I allowed a private space free from interruption, I might be able to work it out in my
own head. Or if I had real friends here, and if I could somehow meet them without the onerous business of driving a car and suffering through the heat, and meet them in some comfortable space, then some kind of life might be possible.
But precisely that is not possible.
I think of the massive "convention hotels" where the American Philosophical Association meets, and I shudder. That is precisely the impossibility which is this country. Those hotels are not designed for human beings. They are sterile and unfriendly machines. Human beings need touch and pleasure, not mere efficiency.
But there is no touch or pleasure for me in this land of destruction.
I am being destroyed as well.
And no one will put my name on the list of victims--if ever the list is compiled.
I am dying in silence.
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