Anesthesia Page #6

How you gone so wrong?

I was 14...

...in the basement of my best

friend's house in Maryland

me and him snuck a bottle

of Sambuca down there

finished it between us.

I ain't never looked back.

This ain't Sambuca.

Discovered the good stuff a lot later.

And your friend?

Now he a fancy n*gger lawyer

who don't answer my calls.

- Maybe him busy with him life.

- Oh, yeah?

You can't see you in charge of yourself

you can't do nothin'.

Do you think I don't know that?

So why you here in a bed got straps?

But then, what do all these

thinkers we've examined this

semester have in common?

If we truly explore to

find a common thread?

At the outset of a century

that would constitute

the bloodiest in human history.

Along with scientific and

technological advancements

that would literally make us like Gods.

Even as we began to dismantle

the very meaning of God.

They ask...

...what is a life?

Does to live any longer have a how?

Does it any longer have a why?

Against a backdrop

of industrialization

people will contend with

alienation, dislocation

population on a mass scale

and murder on a mass scale.

They'll consider the constraints of truth.

Whether metaphor or paradigm

with many concluding actual

truth has never existed.

A nexus in the great human saga...

...when we dared to trade

the organizing bliss

of good and evil, right and wrong

as determined by a

creator for other opiates.

Communism, socialism,

capitalism, psychology

technology, any learnable system

to replace what had begun to evaporate.

The 20th century. My own.

But also the one into

which each of you was born.

For many, an era of hope

liberation, possibility.

For others of

abandonment and despair.

A most human century

in which we begin

really to understand

that Nietzsche was right.

We are beautifully...

...finally...

...achingly...

...alone.

In this void,

philosophy at its worst

becomes self-reflective...

...linguistic, semantic

relativism having

rendered any discussion

of right and wrong, good and evil

to be the quaint

concerns of another age.

At its most provocative,

it asks other questions.

Those concerned with locating

our stranded selves...

...when meaning seems to have died.

He's expecting your call.

So you gonna sign me out or what?

Nothing less, in short,

then why do we live at all?

Call him. Go there.

And what makes us who we are?

They ask what now?

And we're still asking it.

What will fortify us as another century

your century commences?

Do we abandon finally the search for truths

that seem ever more

elusive, even silly to some?

The ethical? The moral? The good?

Principles that by definition

can never be proved

when so much now can be proved?

Or is all this finally

and forever pointless?

Are we done?

We can destroy cities, alter

the planet irreversibly

speak instantaneously

face-to-face

from across the globe.

Create life where

there was to be none

even while intoxicating

ourselves with it all.

And yet, how do we still seek purpose?

And where do we hope to

find it if we're so busy

convincing ourselves there needn't be any?

And so we wander...

...eyes closed to the dark

while technology, science,

medicine and godlessness blaze

illusions around us.

With less to guide us now than ever.

Seemingly omnipotent...

...but more human

and just as afraid.

These quandaries do not

end with this course

in a week from today.

They begin.

And I certainly haven't

taught these writers

for 30 years just so

you can drop references

to existential thinkers

and their antecedents

at dinner parties.

The crowd is untruth.

In an era darkened by the false

shade of imperviousness

you and those who pause to question...

...carry the light.

It's been a wonderful 34 years.

Let's not be strangers.

Either to one another or more importantly

to everything we've

learned from one another.

May your best years be yet to come.

And so for us all.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Hey, what are you doing?

That's my purse!

He's taking my purse!

Motherf***er!

So I heard you gave quite the final lecture

in the survey course.

Well attended anyway. Students

I hadn't seen in years.

I'm sorry I wasn't there.

This is me, so...

You made a promise.

- I know.

- So?

I... I... I can't.

I'll make me a willow cabin at your gate.

Who's that?

Viola from "Twelfth Night."

I said it to my wife 46

years ago when I proposed.

You're gonna be late

getting back to her, so...

And later still the longer we tarry.

I can just get another one.

- I can use cigarettes.

- A moment at a time.

Hmm...

Sophie.

Thank you.

You're worth it.

Where are you?

I was with a student.

The one I told you about.

Should I wait up?

If you can.

- I won't be 10 minutes more.

- Okay.

You're late tonight, sir.

In all the years of coming here

I've never told you my name.

It's Walter.

It would make me so happy

if you called me that.

- Walter.

- Ignacio.

- Good evening.

- Hey.

The allure of that never

fades I'm happy to report.

A couple of bunches of hydrangeas?

You got it.

Gotta have milk, don't you?

Drink milk all my life.

Maybe you drunk milk too.

Look like you've lived a good life.

I have actually.

What's the secret?

You can't imagine how ironic it is

that you're asking me that today.

Perhaps it's as simple as

enjoying a glass of milk

or buying flowers for

your wife every Friday

which I've done for as

long as I can remember

and which I shall do now.

Could you loan me 5 bucks?

For?

Gonna buy drugs, which I need... awful bad.

Hungry too.

I'm gonna give this to

the man at the register

and tell him you can

have anything in the store

one can eat up to $5 worth

and that he is to keep the change.

- Just like that?

- Just like that.

And if you ever see me around here

I'll always do the same for you.

So long as I'm able.

Simplicity of the divine.

- You've read Augustine?

- Not everything.

Don't worry, no one has.

And in translation too.

I'd be lying if I said I

didn't need a moment to process

where this conversation

has suddenly veered.

Come on, man, just help

me out, 50 cents, anything.

Thanks.

Yeah, you better walk away, motherfuckers!

Yo, mister, let me get 50 cents, man.

I'll get you a cup of coffee.

- I want 50 cent.

- Sorry.

Maybe you should let these

young ladies get to their dog.

You gonna tell me what

to do in my neighborhood?

I've lived here 25 years,

but no, it's just a request.

Thanks.

- Thank you.

- Have a good night, Walter.

Goodnight, Ignacio.

Excuse me. He bought that for you?

That he did.

Anyone who ask, he always.

Buena suerta, ese.

Gonna need that too.

- Hey, bud.

- Hmm?

You dropped somethin'.

Help! Help! Help!

Help me!

Help me!

- Yes?

- Help me, help me, please!

Who is this? What's happening?

I'm buzzing you in.

Hey!

No, you motherf***er.

No, motherf***er, this

ain't your f***ing business!

You're doin' me a favor.

A favor?

Rate this script:5.0 / 1 vote