Noah Cicero - Best Behavior

“There's a schizophrenic in Youngstown, an old black man, that walks around saying he's The U.S. Constitution. They used to say they were God or Jesus,” I said.

“There is no meaning to our lives. We have procedures to keep us safe from ourselves, we have rights, but we don't have meaning. We fill this lack of meaning with objects. We survey the landscape and find nothing but objects, gadgets to fill our sense of nihilism. Our constitution doesn't supply that emotional element that binds humans to each other. Ask a Mexican what he is, what his best friend, what his brother is, he points at a church. The Chinese point at an ancient temple, the European at an ancient church or something the Romans built. Something that binds them together as a people that live temporarily on earth.”

Tom stopped in front of a restaurant and we went in. It was an Italian restaurant that didn't serve any of the known Italian foods in Youngstown. None of the servers were Italian or even New Yorkers. All of them had foreign accents. I believe our waiter was French. I ordered a diet Pepsi and Tom ordered water. I decided on the spinach pesto raviolis and Tom got some weird vegan thing.

I said, “But do you believe this leads to nihilism?”

“The Constitution is without emotion. It gives humanity procedures that reduce the possibility of violent conflict. It allows for the freedom of man and gives him a reason to flourish. But it doesn't give us beauty, it doesn't have poetry, it doesn't create an emotional bond between us. And that is what nihilism is, it is life without emotion. The Declaration of Independence says we get these rights from God. But it doesn't tell the story of a man wandering in the wilderness for forty years, going through great travails, suffering to bring us this message. This message from God comes from really rich white men who owned slaves, and had so much money they could sit for months doing nothing but talking. Because that is what the story is, there's the war and everything. But the constitution is not the story of men going through hell, sitting alone in the desert speaking to the gods, fasting and living with inner turmoil like the prophets. No, it's the story of very rich white men sitting around talking and bitching at each other. Compare it to the story of the French Revolution, the peasants coming together after years of oppression to fight the nobles. The Storming of the Bastille. The immense struggle that took place to recreate their country into one that people could live in. It is a powerful story that the oppressed can hang onto, they can cry over, that they can share a drink over. That perhaps all the oppressed of the world can share a drink over. But where is the emotion in The Constitution? There is none.”

“But we drink at the Fourth of July. We have fireworks, we have parties, and barbecue.”

“So is that our religion, the government?”

“Well, we still have the Protestants. They're going strong,” I said.

“That isn't an ancient religion though. That's Elmer Gantry crap. There is no history in American Protestantism. Their Jesus isn't an ancient Jew that lives in the desert and shits in an outhouse. That religion was created on this land 120 years ago. Their Jesus isn't a homeless Jesus. Their Jesus is this hard working man who has short hair and combs it to the left. He wears suits. He gets up every day and works. He plays the game. Their Jesus believes that working for owners, doing what they're told without question to get raises to buy more crap is the apex of the religious experience. They believe Jesus has actually blessed them when they get granted a loan for a Hummer. They believe in a Loan God. The God that grants loans, that supplies credit; the God that supplies air-conditioning and allows a person to turn their heat up to 72. It isn't a God of suffering. The poetics are there, the emotion is there, they are bound by their belief in their capitalist God. But history isn't there. No one enters a Protestant church and thinks, 'This is an old religion created by a Jew 2,000 years ago.' You enter a Catholic church and can't help thinking that you've entered a very old tradition. When the priest comes out wearing those funny clothes, one can see this establishment goes back a very long time.”

“But Catholics are very much about procedure.”

“But is it procedure or ritual? What's the difference? That's the question. A procedure is this lifeless thing that humans must go through so it liquidates human emotion so that we don't kill each other. Rituals are these things humans do that create emotional bonds between fellow humans so that they don't kill each other.”

“But the Eucharist is nonsense. The blood and body of Christ turned into a wafer. There's no sense to that, we want to make sense now.”

“But do humans want to make sense? We have lived on this planet for 100,000 years not making any fucking sense, then 350 years ago, like 10 white guys wrote some things down that made sense. And our Founding Fathers decided to write up a document that made sense. Then some other European nations decided to make sense, and then they went all over the earth forcing everyone at gun point to make sense without ever asking them if they wanted to make sense.”

“Are you saying we don't want to make sense?”

“They like science. They like the science of air-conditioners — of cars, of plastic baggies, of cell phones — they like the science that goes into making products. They like the procedures that reduce violence amongst humans. But they don't like viewing the world in such a way that when they make a peanut butter sandwich alone in their kitchen, it means nothing. That when their child dies, or they foreclose on their house, or when their car gets repossessed, or when life turns into shit that it means nothing. A Muslim having a bad day can walk next door and pray with his fellow Muslim. Then they tell stories to each other of past Muslims and their trials through life. An American stands in his kitchen and holds his toaster he bought with a credit card asking the object to give him his prestige back.”

“But these procedures have created a safe world.”

“No, I'm not saying that at all. There are many countries that have a lot of governmental procedures that created safety, and limit conflict to heated debate and not guns. But Europe, South America and Asia supply their citizens with a sense of history. Our nation doesn't supply that. There is no cross-cultural emotional link between the office worker in New York City, the factory worker in Ohio, the farmer in Nebraska and the camera man in California. When something bad happens there is nothing that binds us together.”

“But that is everywhere. It’s the reason for nationalism.”

“So God has died, and with it, all His beautiful literature of courage and hope. And instead of rebuilding literature to show us how to create our lives, we focus on creating the perfect procedures.”

Our food came and we chewed and swallowed. We stopped talking about government and talked of movies we had seen recently. He discussed Fassbinder, Goddard, and other long forgotten film makers that no one cares about anymore. He sent me some burned DVDs in the mail; I watched them and told him my impressions. I confessed that all I really watch are movies starring small Asians kicking people's asses.

We finished our food and walked out onto the street. It was around 12 and I needed to meet Petra. She was a woman I met through writing. She was a friend of a guy in Austin, Texas who published some of my writing two years before. She read the writing and emailed me. She wrote long emails about feelings and what she did during the day. Petra's emails were always wrought with emotion and sensitivity. When people emailed me, most of the time, they either told me they liked my writing or asked me to read something they wrote. I rarely ever read what people wrote. I would skim it to see if I liked it, but no matter what I wrote back that I liked it. I saw no reason to be mean to someone. Most people never decide to express themselves through writing, why deter people from doing it.