An Infinite Melancholy

*



Maroubra Beach.

"Very few people really care about freedom, about liberty, about the truth, very few. Very few people have guts, the kind of guts on which a real democracy has to depend. Without people with that sort of guts a free society dies or cannot be born."
Doris Lessing.

"This is what people do not tell you. What is wrong with being old is it's so boring. A very good remark which people should remember. They talk all this...rubbish about how you get older, wiser all that. Rubbish! You get-bad tempered."
Doris Lessing.


He tried to reach out, a hand draped in desperation, longing, don't forget the camp effect, he tried to struggle back into some form of consciousness. The government had lost him entirely. The left were in power from coast to coast and the chattering classes now ran the country. There had been so many false dawns. He didn't know who he was. The nurse came in and he pretended, unsuccessfully, to be asleep.

Are you alight? she asked.
I need to go to the toilet, he said.
There's a bucket, she said.
I want to go to the toilet properly, he said. Slowly; as if the whole world had been cemented into glue.
I'll check with the guards, she said.
Thank you, he said.

He could see her through the glass walls discussing him with two very bored looking security guards. There was some nodding and debate going on. What good could possibly come out of all this?
She came back in with the guards, two beefy blokes dressed entirely in black, both carrying those sticks they used to beat people into submission.
What possible harm could I do? he asked.
You'd be surprised, said one of the guards, apparently amused. For a start, you cause trouble, we're in trouble.
He tried to get to his feet, grimacing until the men took him firmly on either side.
He wasn't going to run for it, not this minute, that was for sure.

That little bit of business, you knew, you did it, he said to one of the guards, who looked at him puzzled.
You haven't been well, the guard replied.
They escorted, virtually carried, him to an innocuous looking bathroom door only about 30 metres from his room. How he missed his implant, he couldn't tell anything about the world he was in, not even his location.

There was nothing, no source of pain, the discomfort minor. The guards stood outside while he went into the toilet, barely more than a small service cubicle. This wasn't going to be his great escape plan, that was for sure. And even if he could escape, where would he go? Families had been abolished, he didn't have anyone special, they had seen to that long ago.

He sat on the toilet, desperate for time to think, still woozy from the drugs. There was no convenient window he could climb through, like in the movies.

Those who abided by the rules had suffered. They reached in everywhere. He was in danger. He didn't know if they could still monitor his thoughts, but thought so. What was he going to tell his boss? Where was his phone?

He flushed the toilet loud and long, keeping the button depressed. He couldn't have been clearer, he wanted to escape. He kept trying to mask his own thoughts, in case the implant had been converted to a monitor. He had heard it was possible.

He came back out, after having washed his hands at some length.
When will they fix me? he asked the nurse.
Tomorrow, she said, you're scheduled for another operation.
Did anyone ring my boss?
That's all been taken care of. You just have to try not to think, get some rest.
Easily said.
I know it's hard, I know you're struggling to figure out who you are, we get a lot of people through here, we're used to the struggles, she said.
Why are you being nice to me? he asked.
You seem nice, she said. And you were one of the first elites to go online, I'm interested, we're interested.
What will they do to me?
Make you whole again.
Will I remember who I was, who I am now? Will I remember you?
Not likely. Sometimes patients remember us; have dreams that feature this hospital, all white and glass. Mostly they forget.
He looked at her. He was being led back to his room by the goons. For a moment he tried to shake them off, feebly, he got nowhere. They tightened their grip. It wasn't even clear they had noticed.
I wanted to read a book, he said.
She looked at him, clearly surprised out of her professional veneer.
There haven't been any books for years, she said as he was helped back into the bed. There's nothing I can bring you. I heard they used to read in the hospitals in the old days, but I've never seen it.
He knew, now, he was totally lost.
Oddly, the guards fluffed up the cushions for him, making him more comfortable.
Nothing at all? he asked the nurse.
Nothing, she said.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/china-spurns-rudds-call/2008/04/10/1207420587831.html

CHINA'S leadership has rebuffed Kevin Rudd's call for action on the human rights abuses in Tibet but says it will not affect what is an otherwise healthy relationship.

The Premier, Wen Jiabao, rejected urgings from Mr Rudd during their meeting yesterday, which ran over time as the Prime Minister pressed China to engage in talks with the Dalai Lama's representatives.

While both sides agreed to disagree on Tibet, the otherwise fruitful discussions resulted in a new climate-change partnership aimed at developing clean coal technology and an agreement to resume talks on a free trade agreement.

The Minister for Trade, Simon Crean, will go to Beijing next week to "unfreeze" the trade discussions, which were begun by the Howard government but had become "stalemated and frozen", Mr Rudd said.

Mr Rudd and Mr Wen met for 2½ hours in the Great Hall of the People. Mr Rudd said there was such "considerable discussion" on Tibet and the Olympics that the meeting ran 30 minutes over time.

He put to Mr Wen his publicly stated position that there were significant human rights abuses in Tibet, that both sides needed to show restraint, and that the long-term governance of Tibet needed to be solved by dialogue.

When Mr Rudd first made the comments publicly, China protested diplomatically, and a government spokesman rubbished them as "totally unfounded".

http://news.smh.com.au/china-warns-ioc-on-political-statements/20080410-2555.html

China has warned the Olympics governing body to keep "irrelevant political factors" away from the Games, after its chief urged Beijing to honour pledges to improve human rights.

International Olympic Committee Jacques Rogge said pro-Tibet protests dogging the torch relay had left the Games in crisis, and publicly reminded China of its promise to advance human rights.

Hours later, China said it had uncovered a criminal ring planning to kidnap athletes and others at the August Games.

And Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, said no-one had the right to tell protesters demanding freedom for his homeland "to shut up".

http://www.reuters.com/article/gc05/idUSN0940797620080410

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush said on Thursday he would suspend U.S. troop withdrawals from Iraq this summer but cut the length of tours of duty, as he defended his war policy that will leave any resolution of the conflict to his successor.

Bush endorsed a recommendation by his commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, to complete a limited withdrawal of combat forces by July but then impose a 45-day freeze on the total number of troops at about 140,000 to assess the security situation before considering more cuts.

"I've told him he'll have all the time he needs," Bush said.

Petraeus had told a contentious congressional debate on the costly and unpopular war this week that progress was "fragile and reversible" and a renewed outbreak of violence had killed 20 U.S. troops so far in April.



Maroubra Beach.