The system

RAYMUND FERNANDEZ

This is all about feeding Mr. Toise. We say it like the French — Mister Twa, short for Tortoise, Mr. Tortoise. But he may well be a she. She needs to be a few more years older before the pet shop can tell us for sure. But what does it matter? We call him Mr. Toise. We have just one word between each other. From time to time he says, “Kwaaak!” I interpret this to mean he wants to be fed. I get some greens from the ref. I say, “Kwaaak!” And he comes to me.

I take a few minutes to watch him eat. It gives me inexplicable pleasure to do this. I give him a bit of lettuce, string beans, cabbage. He likes greens. Otherwise, I theorize he eats anything. We have seen him dig up cat poo. If we leave dog poo on the front yard, he will go for it. We make sure to discourage him from doing this, but we cannot be absolutely perfect in this regard. We surmise his digestive system can process anything. That his own poo has no smell at all might be evidence of this efficiency. He is a desert creature.

But now he lives inside a system we establish between us. It is an easy system. Over time, he has learned to communicate to us his needs. We communicate our own willingness to help him survive comfortably. We live inside this system. It is a simple enough system.

It is too simple to work even as metaphor for the system humans have between each other. There is nothing simple about the human system for survival. One risks error by simplifying it into short straightforward statements. And yet humans do this all the time: Be on the side of the powerful.

Don’t rock the boat. Back the right horse. Do everything that needs doing. Be ruthless. These are the rules of success in the common world. They are good principles to go by if one wants to climb to power. And truly, the system calls for these rules. The system rewards it.

But as one may expect, climbing up the system ensures both survival and success; but this may not have anything to do with happiness or being loved or feeling fulfilled in the end. To achieve the latter, one has to tweak the system’s rules a little bit. One makes a good start by accepting the inherent complexity of the system itself. Quite certainly, a man ought strive for success, but how exactly? Is there such as thing as enough? When is enough exactly enough? Nothing in the system comes for free. Everything carries a price tag. How much cost is one willing to pay or sacrifice to get its balance in the sense of success? If one is willing to pay anything, will one’s success also be exactly as unlimited? Most likely so. We were trained to think so, weren’t we?

The system’s complexity derives from the fact of competition. Humans compete with each other for anything and everything. They compete especially for limited resources. And since time is the most limited of all man’s resources, it is time which we compete the hardest for. Under the system, a person’s success depends always on the amount of time one pays in its pursuit. Inside the system, the person must take time away from something in order to devote it to something else. The funny thing about time is that it keeps moving forward however one uses it. It is not a limitless resource. In the end, one runs out of it. At that end point, the totality of the whole chronological episode of one’s life must sufficiently justify itself. It must do this beyond the complexity of life itself. Is it inevitable that life must be so complex?

The system between Mr. Toise and I is simple. It works in its simplicity. It works despite the fact we only have a single word between us. We need only this single word because ours is a system rooted on trust. He survives because of me. He helps also in my survival in ways I find myself rediscovering every day. His contribution is nothing short of profound. He gives me occasion to love an entity beyond myself, without expecting anything in return; in another way of saying: uselessly. And yet, Mr. Toise gives me one additional reason to live. There is no measure of success between us that is not absolutely mutual. We never compete.