As an artist and as a human being my good friend David Schoffman is a man of honor. To claim his companionship one must undergo a cold introspective trial that will inevitably highlight a deficit of virtue. Next to the halogens of David's lofty ideals we are all dimmed in decrepitude.
His moral compass is unforgiving. His aesthetic standards insulate him from the vicissitudes of popular taste. He is a fortress of consistency and a dull, grey edifice of rectitude and refinement.
His hobbies include parsing Latin prosody and restoring antique lamps.
He rises before dawn and works an unwavering ten-hours a day in his studio.
He does seventy-five push-ups each morning (down from 150, before he incurred an inflamed pectoralis minor) and remains glutenrein and lactose free in an organic diet of unspeakable self-denial.
He hasn't watched TV since 9/11 (reluctantly) and still uses the word text as a noun.
In other words, he's a world-class bore.
Though life demands of its participants the capacity for negative capability, David has quieted his inner dissonances with equivocations and rationales. His cosmology resists the chaos of ambiguity and the ethical deliriums of doubt.
That is, until he found himself tempted like poor Anthony by a panoply of vices even the Saint would have found impossible to abjure.
First came bacon whose scintillating sizzle and sweet gamey aroma demands crisp consummation by a moistening palate. His first crucible came at a faculty brunch, a meal he never fully accepted as legitimate or justified. He found watching his colleagues fully absorbed in this greasy delicacy oddly moving. Instead of consulting his watch as is typical for him during these mandatory meetings he sat bemused and a bit disoriented by the simplicity of pleasure.
Though he didn't eat any of the bacon himself that day, it did, so to speak, give him food for thought.
He soon started toying with the idea of acquiring an extra pillow. "A good night's sleep," though something he always considered as a birthright, now appeared like an experience he could induce and improve upon. This led to reading mystery novels, first on airplanes and then on hammocks strung between indolent fruit trees. The slope soon slipped into binge watching on Netflix, full-fat yoghurt, Bruce Springsteen records and figure skating.
It was all so gradual and benign that no one took notice until he was seen on Venice beach kissing a woman who wasn't his wife.
And though it was remarked upon that his eyes remained open, the idea that David was now grazing in a neighbor's meadow was welcomed by acquaintances who always felt cheapened by his righteousness.
He tells me he is enjoying his new uncertainty. After decades of practiced orthodoxy he feels suddenly lighter, freer and capable of guilt.
"Though I waste a lot of time these days I feel more fully human. I have finally entered the stream of the world and it ain't so bad after all."
(Note the colloquialism ain't)
I heard he's even questioning his convictions on the Middle East!
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