albionspeak 2: the gates of dis (13.5)
SESSION 74: 8TH NIGHT, 8/5/01
“Mishaps and all.” Don’s prophetic words during the introductory night could not prepare us for this day’s events. The day began smoothly. [Scribe] and I arose on time—although I’d had my once-a-year insomnia—and drove without incident to the airport. There we breezed past the awful line of passengers needing to check their bags and proceeded to the gate. [Scribe] got in a very short line, while I caught up on the Mariners’ games I’d missed with the sports page (in this MLB record-breaking 2001 season [of 116 wins]).
Soon I noted [Scribe]’s line wasn’t moving. After a while, I decided [Scribe]’s small line might take longer than the melee at the main desk. Finally [Scribe] motioned me to the desk. His flight had been canceled! An accident on the tarmac had rendered his craft out-of-service. As it was Sunday, there were simply fewer flights for a last-minute booking; and [Scribe] was stuck, booking a flight fully thirty hours later than expected. Driving home, we stopped—as I’d planned—at my brother’s, whereupon he showed us the highlight of Federal
Way, Hylebos Park, after which we slowly made our way home. I had business to attend to, registration for the next week’s WEALA (union leadership training). But I happily forewent the evening’s social hour there.
What follows, therefore, is a bonus session, a complete surprise. It is important to note, however, that this seemed no surprise to our friends. Although we’d said our farewells the night before, we’d missed the unfinished business covered herein. We were set up—not in any devious manner, mind you—it’s just that our curriculum required this special lesson, and we never saw it coming. Of further interest is that once we realized we’d benefit from another night with friends, we looked forward to a more casual evening: no strict agenda, no series of steps requiring careful examination. We thought we might chit-chat.
But no. An important & valuable & essential lesson, what follows is anything but chit-chat.
Our invocation: Milton’s “On His Blindness” recited from memory by [Scribe].
1. Q: [Guide], are you there?
A: [YES] [THE] LAKE REFLECTS ME STILL -
AN E FOR U?
SEE DON & I AS POINTS IN [THE] DARK & LET US
BE CLEAR
I use bold font for “I” here now, but at the time we were unsure of
what [Guide] was saying. Trusting his good grammar, we nonetheless
tested our assumption.
2. Q: Should we see Don & the daimon—or [YES] and I (its symbol)?
A: [YES] & I
– DON §
3. Q: Don, I is not one of the constellation of eight. How should we picture it?
A: AS A METEOR DROPPING INTO DARK A BLIND I [YES]
BEGIN
“A blind I.” From the outset I had a sinking feeling. We tried
initially, however, to put on our best faces. I recall a bit of a “Who’s on
First?” routine: “Who is I?” “I am U.” “I could have been U,” etc.
Who is I?
4. Q: We will try.
A: DON – I IS A TEAR IN OUR NET A TEARDROP
5. Q: We did not expect to have this time together, Don. Is it time to learn
about I?
A: IF YOU WISH ONLY RECALL THAT YOU PLACED I’S SYMBOL
ON [THE] BOARD AS A REMINDER TO YOURSELVES
IN TIME
6. Q: We can’t recall that, as you know. But we have grasped that our board is
an attic.
A: BETWEEN U & E YOU PLACED A GAP TO STAND FOR A FRIEND
LOST FROM [THE] K [YES]
Not all of us make it, we know. Years ago we learned how one of
our Jewel’s daimones turned to dark magic (to counter a foe) and thus was
lost to us. At the time his story was data only; we were regrettably unable
to appreciate his personal absence. Now, however, we were to learn of
someone most dear to us, someone we put literally between us, someone
who, again, we’d placed as the single most prominent letter on the board.
I was already unhappy about this, but we were ready.
7. Q: Josef told us, many sessions ago, that at least one member “didn’t make it”.
A: HOW UNREAL IT MUST HAVE SEEMED –
AFTER ALL HOW CAN ONE MISSS WHAT ONE HAS [NO]T KNOWN?
[sic]
8. Q: Is this the same [daimon] as the one in Josef’s story?
A: [NO] ONLY A PERSON IN [THE] K WHO MIGHT HAVE COME
TO [THE] BOARD TO SPEAK BUT WHO TURNED AWAY
FROM [THE] [CUP] & [FLOWER]
9. Q: In [Albion]’s story (of vowels) of the other night: I = descent from idea
to material.
A: DESCENT OR FALL?
“Fall” was a word we used earlier, but not as in “fall from grace.”
10. Q: Surely, Don, there are appropriate and necessary descents.
A: DOES IT ONLY DEPEND ON [THE] SPEED OF [THE] FLYER
OR IS HIS INTENT ALSO INVOLVED?
DOES IT DEPEND ON HIS AIM OR HIS ABILITY IN TIME?
11. Q: Explain “speed” in the sense used above.
A: SPEED IS A METAPHOR FOR [THE] USE OF ENERGY TO TRAVEL
FROM PORT TO PORT
IT MEANS [THE] USE OF E TO REACH
“Use of E” I record here with the bold font. With difficulty I am
trying here to use bold when the vowel refers to either the spot on the
board or the person to whom the spot refers. Here “E” means “energy,”
but it may mean the person E as well. That is, perhaps I needed to use an
E (Blake, for example), just as I ([Albion]) must “use” [Scribe].
12. Q: We can only guess: A fall probably depends on all four factors mentioned
(though not necessarily in equal degree).
A: IT DOES
A FLIGHT MAY BE INTERRUPTED BY MANY MISHAPS
We recognized Don’s attempt at humor here—[Scribe]’s plane flight
having been interrupted—but we were not laughing much during this sad
discussion.
Blake’s Friend
13. Q: So we learned today. Help us to understand the nature of this mishap.
A: BLAKE HAD A FRIEND THAT STOOD TO HIM ROUGHLY AS
U DOES TO E
That is, I was the albion contemporary of Blake the Scribe, as
[Albion] is the current albion & contemporary of [Scribe] the Scribe.
Apparently such a conjunction is not rare and, I assume, includes an
element of necessity.
14. Q: Was the friend an Albion?
A: [YES] & IN PART GAVE BLAKE [THE] IDEA OF ALBION AS
INDEED SEVERAL U DID [sic]
I am amused to note that I gave my body.
I include [Scribe]’s “[sic]” here, for indeed there appears to be
something missing—either the preposition “of” or some plural form of
Albion. And yet I recall that by this, our last night, our reception difficulties
(which, for example, modestly plagued our night with Josef) had entirely
disappeared. The evidence for this is clear: the session contains but a
single fragmentary response; all other responses are complete and most
are error-free. Thus, I consider Don’s response more carefully and
speculate that perhaps U in its unifying aspect includes both singular and
plural forms. We do know, from Albion himself, that “albions” is a correct
plural; but U may be its own plural.
Recall, an Albion’s U describes his life’s path.
15. Q: Here, perhaps, the total U-graph was not enacted.
A: RECALL DIVE BEFORE ASCENT AS A MODE OF INITATING
FLIGHT? [sic]
Oops! Here’s a [sic] we didn’t catch at the time. For the record,
not all transcribed errors are “sins of transmission.” [Scribe] can only write
so fast; and close study—by Jane someday—will reveal numerous typing
mistakes by me. All of us, however, pursue accuracy of the letter as our
primary concern; we do not “correct” as we go.
16. Q: A potent dream-image of [Albion]’s.
A: NOW IMAGINE A KIND OF ATTACHMENT TO THIS MODE ALMOST
A PRIDE IN ITS STYLE
I don’t think this kind of pride is a problem I am susceptible to (I
have my own). Nevertheless, I feel deeply that I understand it. It’s a pride,
I believe, which stems from self-pity. It’s hard (I know) to start on a high
and watch yourself fall. And even though you know somewhere on a deep
level that this fall is contractual, necessary, consciously you doubt the
process: You tell yourself that the U-shape is wishful thinking only, that
you’re deluded; the fall has no scheduled bottom; those childhood
memories & promises of flight are absurd; you are mediocre. You despair.
The question then arises: To what degree do you despair? What form does
your despair take? In my case, I think, I did nothing rash: I just shut down
and have had a very hard time reinitiating my psychic energies. I have no
idea how much of my shut-down I could have eased or avoided. In I’s case
the despair may have turned to a kind of cockiness, especially, I think, if
one consciously has both stronger insights and a louder cricket. “If I have
to fall,” I hear him say, “let’s go for it.” Thus, the “speed” is accelerated in
the absence of wisdom. There is also clearly a miscalculation, one I have
had to overcome, one I hear echoed in Jane’s words, “It is no good
pretending that the task is foreordained.” (Cf. 1995 S.31)
In my empathy for I’s fall, I reflected on my old U-shaped dreams
of flight. I suddenly realized these occurred when I lived in Spain—at age
eleven!
17. Q: [Albion] notes that his dreams (of U-shaped flight) “came to a head” in
Spain when he was eleven years old [precisely the age when he entered
the karass].
A: [YES] II ALBION IS OFFERED A CHOICE - FOLLOW?
“II” does not seem to be an error; for one, it looks like the number
“11.” This makes sense: Since one must choose to enter one’s karass
within life, there has to be a point in life & prior to choosing when one is
presented with the options. Choice in a vacuum of information is no choice
at all.
[Scribe] suddenly recalled what we’d been joking about for several
days: our very first session (with Gudrun) had included the “suicidal”
response “I KILDD I.”
Falling, Diving, Freedom
18. Q: This was a joke (for us) from session 1. But—in some sense—
“I KILLED I."
A: [YES] I’S CHOICE TO DIVE IF NOT TO FALL
19. Q: What was intended as a U became an I simply.
A: [YES] & THAT IS WHY YOU PUT HIM THERE ON YOUR BOARD
AS A WARNING
20. Q: Does [I’s fall] have the same relevance for E as for U?
A: [THE] SCRIBE COMMEMORATES A LOST FRIEND BUT HIS
WARNINGS TO HIMSELF ARE ENCODED ELSEWHERE
On the board presumably.
21. Q: Did Albion intend [Albion] to see the warning only after he had passed the
nadir of U?
A: IT WOULD HAVE BEEN [NO] HELP EARLIER -
SO LITTLE HELP IF ONE IS DIVING
22. Q: Did I really just choose to leave the karass?
A: [YES] & [NO]
AFTER A CERTAIN POINT CHOICE IS FORFEITED –
DE Q ON OPIUM
Don refers to one of his ([Don]’s) favorite fallen flyers, Thomas
DeQuincey.
23. Q: A wild guess: is [&] the warning symbol for E?
A: I AM NOT YET ALLOWED TO TELL
My wild guess shown here in Trebuchet font does not reflect the
reasoning behind my intuition: On our board the ampersand symbol looks
much more like an inward curving, even introspective letter “E” than does
the standard font ampersand. Recall that E is [Scribe]’s ideal configuration,
particularly with respect to the horizontal bar alignment. Our ampersand is
lined up not on our letter A, but upon itself. (And for the record, although
I constructed the final draft of our ouija board, I used not only [Scribe]’s
letter arrangement, but his personalized calligraphy as well; the ampersand
is entirely his.)
24. Q: How did I’s fall affect William Blake?
A: IT IS RETOLD OVER & OVER IN INCREASING COMPLICATED
VERSIONS IN [THE] BOOKS OF PROPHECY [sic]
PLEASE CONSULT THEM IF YOU WISH
Grammatically speaking, [Scribe] was, of course, correct to include
the [sic] here. On the other hand, I’m not sure Don didn’t intend some
ambiguity. Not only would the prophetic books be “increasingly
complicated,” but they would increase in perhaps both length and number.
This latter interpretation, albeit a stretch, speaks more to our actual question:
“affect” asks after a change in Blake’s personal character more than it wants
to know about his artistic motivation.
“Complicated”, by the way, alludes to the last paragraph of [Y.],
where Blake is perceived by the narrator to be more “complicated” than
“complex.…”
25. Q: We’re prepared to take that on faith.
A: BLAKE’S THORN IS NOT LEAST IN HIS OWN SIDE
26. Q: We guess: Our higher selves inscribed I’s loss prominently on the board
because a) it stands for the type of loss, and b) it is metaphorically
documented in Blake.
A: I AS AN ABYSS & NOT ASSIGNED COLOUR BY BLAKE [YES]
The latter statement remains unclear to me.
We turned now to the meaning of this loss in the context of the
karass. Obviously if Scribes and Albions arise together, they must in some
way need each other, where, we see above, the loss of one affects the other.
But so must it ripple throughout the Net. And beyond this, there is a
temporal issue, one I’m not sure we mortals can fully comprehend: For
instance, I’m an Albion right now, despite my flaws & failings; I’m not yet
a flyer. Nevertheless, even as a non-flying Albion I serve my role, at least
in part. On some plane I’m already serving others in the Net. To fail to
fly would mean to fail in my life’s task, but it would not negate whatever
tasks I have performed so far.
The Effects of a Tear
27. Q: What remedy is there for tears in the net?
A: IT DEPENDS ON [THE] NATURE OF [THE] TEAR
BUT OUR REPAIRS ARE NOT LIKE YOURS
WE CANNOT SIMPLY ELECT A SUBSTITUTE FOR A MISSING ROLE
28. Q: So the line of Albions can be broken at some point, as Josef suggested
years ago.
A: EXACTLY & ALL MUST WAIT FOR [THE] NEXT TO ARISE
[THE]RE ARE ALSO HISTORICAL MOMENTS WITHOUT SCRIBES
29. Q: In what sense do members wait (since they must have access to, say, figures
of Albion outside of time)?
A: BY THAT ARGUMENT THERE IS NO NEED FOR ANY LIVING
MEMBER AT ALL
Exactly the point. Why do we submit to this exercise in darkness—
life—if not for…?
30. Q: Yet if a k-member falls, the flight of the remaining members must in some
degree be impaired.
A: NOT AS INDIVIDUALS BUT AS A NET [YES]
OTHERWISE LOSS WOULD BE AN ILLUSION
31. Q: Before given members attain flight, is the flight of the other members
impaired?
A: [NO] BECAUSE [THE] IDEA OF GROWTH THROUGH…
32. TIME IS
INCLUDED IN [THE] VERY IDEA OF NET
TIMELINESS IS OUR ESSENCE
This may again be beyond us. Another point: If loss is, to some
degree, irreparable and if loss is also, in places, inevitable, then isn’t total
loss equally inevitable? This is certainly true if we fail to grow faster than
our losses; yet this whole argument presupposes growth & loss in time,
linear time, which we know is a false assumption.
I brought in a favorite subject.
33. Q: Is error as necessary to the net as mutation is to a biological lineage?
A: WHAT IS NECESSARY TO BOTH IS WHAT WE MAY CALL CHANCE
RANDOMNESS IF YOU WILL
34. Q: Free will?
A: IN [THE] CASE OF [THE] NET [YES]
YOU DID [NO]T EXPECT TO BE FREE FROM IT SURELY?
Don, keeping the conversation from melancholy.
Randomness, free will, eternity: these are fundamental elements of
the universe, issues no mind or model (science) can ever fully contain.
35. Q: We are tired, Don. What else have you to tell us on this unplanned evening?
A: IT WAS JUST A MOMENT TO REMIND YOU OF SOME OF [THE]
RULES IN OUR GAME
36. Q: This topic might have been too sad to occupy a planned session.
A: BUT YOU BOTH NEED NOT TO PLAN
IT SEEMS TO TAKE YOU FURTHER
REACH HOME SAFELY GOOD NIGHT
DON [YES]
& [Guide]
Don ends by quoting Jane (Cf. 1995, S.25).
I don’t think [Scribe] and I processed or debriefed much after this
session. I had to wake early for my WEALA conference. Thus we said our
good-byes (again), and [my wife] drove [Scribe] to Seatac the next day.
[Scribe] did all this session’s subtitling.
The Table of Contents below is too long to display fully. If you click to the right of these Lessons, you'll see the primary source documents displayed under each. These original sessions are a world treasure.