--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb <no_reply@...> wrote: > > To believe, or not to believe: that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler > in the mind to believe in the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, > or to take arms against a sea of beliefs in "support of nature," and > disbelieving, benefit from it anyway? > > That's my Shakespearean riff on the things that two types of people here > might choose to believe about my latest Parisian rap. The simple > backstory of this rap is that my desire -- or intent, in a Castanedan > sense -- was to find a relatively inexpensive place to stay when I'm > first there, in one of the more expensive cities on Earth. It's > difficult to find hotel rooms for under 100 Euros ($130) a night, > especially in nice areas. The cheap hotel I'd stayed in before, a > discovery passed along to me by Robert Crumb, is totally booked up, > which is understandable because it's a clean (if spartan) hotel in an > acceptable (if uninteresting) quartier for more like 50 Euros a night. > > But even if that place had been available, all of those hotel bills add > up, and sadly come out of my own pocket, since I'm a consultant on this > gig, not an employee. So I went looking for the proverbial Better Deal. > I tried the big short-term rental agencies, but they couldn't do any > better than L'Hotel du Mister Natural (not its real name), and wanted > huge deposits when renting for less than a year. Then a friend > recommended Airbnb.com, which had some reasonable places with no huge > deposits, and Craigslist. > > Bingo on the latter. I was perusing its lists of available short-term > apartments, and stumbled upon one that looked from the headline as if it > were a misprint. The weekly rate was simply too low, especially for the > neighborhood. My disbelief only expanded when I clicked on the link and > saw photos of the place. It was small but clean, impeccably maintained, > and featuring everything I wanted. So I wrote to the owners, expecting > them to come back to me saying that the price in the Craigslist ad was a > typo, and instead they wrote back saying that the place was mine through > March (which gives me time to search for something more permanent), and > for 26 Euros a night. > > In Paris you can pay more than that to share a room in a youth hostel > with eight hippies from Morocco and Eastern Europe who will steal your > underwear during the night if you don't sleep with one eye open. And for > that price I get a beautifully decorated studio in a historic building > in the Marais, a neighborhood I know well, so well that I wasn't even > looking for places there because I assumed I'd never be able to afford > them. Go figure. > > Now, back to the Shakespearean aside above. Some folks here, if such as > stroke of outrageous fortune happened to them, would call it "support of > nature," and chalk it up to their minds being 10,000X more powerful than > lesser humans' minds, and to having not skipped a butt-bouncing session > in years. Heck, they'd chalk up hitting two green lights in a row to > those Woo Woo causes. :-) > > But none of that applies to me. I'm Off The Program. So WTF? > > Don't get me wrong. I *don't* believe in "support of nature," because > that would imply either benevolence on the part of sentient beings I > don't believe exist or the non-sentient intervention of non-personal but > inviolable "laws of nature" that I suspect -- if they even exist -- are > FAR too busy running nature to bother with my sorry ass. > > But I *do* believe in "being on a roll," or "being in tune," or, more > simply, Just Being Lucky. I suspect that this apartment is a combination > of all three. I would *not* have checked Craigslist if a friend hadn't > reminded me of it, so that was Just Being Lucky, as was stumbling across > that ad an hour after it was posted. As for being on a roll, that's been > happening a LOT lately, ever since the song "Free Man In Paris" got > stuck in my head a few days ago. > > So what do you guys think? After all, the hardcore TBs here *can't* > admit that I had "support of nature" on my side, because I'm > so...so...evil and Off The Program and all. So that's right out. They > also can't admit that I in any way "deserve" it, because some of them > believe (and at least one has even said) that what I "deserve" is a long > stretch in hell for all the things I've said about TM and the TMO and > Maharishi. So I'm curious as to what they ascribe my good fortune *TO*. > > Me, I'll stick with Just Good Luck. I've had that going for me all my > life, and in spades. By rights, given the dice-roll of chance, I should > have been dead twenty times over or living under a bridge somewhere, but > noooooooo. Instead I've had a remarkably fortunate life. No complaints. > NONE. > > So what do you think is UP with that? > > It pretty much can't be the benevolence of gods or goddesses or Woo Woo > Wiseguys looking after me from on high, because I bloody well don't > believe in them. It's not a "growing integration of mind and body" from > TM or the TMSP, because I don't believe in that, either, and don't > practice either. > > I'm gonna go with Dumb Luck, and enjoy my time in the Marais. It's a > vibrant, lively scene, with lots of wonderful cafes and restaurants and > clubs, and close to a lot of evening entertainment. Some here of the > homophobic persuasion might not like it because it's also a big gay > area, but that never bothered me in Sitges (40% gay) and won't in the > Marais, either. It'll be a bit longer of a commute to work than I > wanted, but on a straight Metro line -- no changes -- so that's OK with > me. > > All in all, I'm jazzed. And suspect that I will continue to be while > there, literally, because I'll be down the street from one of Paris' > oldest jazz clubs, where Miles and Coltrane and others played. I'm > still, in fact, a little incredulous, hardly believing in my own Dumb > Luck, but it does seem to be happening, so cool. > > Even if some of you manage to convince me that this is all really due to > "support of nature," that won't make it any cooler. Dumb Luck seems to > work just as well for me as TMers' "support of nature" does for them, > and it certainly costs less, both in terms of cash and the amount of > belief-baggage one has to carry around. >
Gahna Karmanyo Gathi
