IMMOBILE

Here in Paris it is said that on any given day the average man entertains conflicting thoughts approximately 92% of the time. This, of course, renders decision making rather difficult.

 We call it Bousqué's Paradox after the famous French chemist who invented artificial sweeteners in the early 1920's. The story goes that Professor Bousqué was so torn between his wife and his mistress that after the age of 33 he became completely impotent for the rest of his life.

I too suffer from this dilemma but not nearly as much as my good friend David Schoffman.

Dissonance simultanée or what is known among American psychologists as synchronal dissonance is a very common condition among Jewish men. The dialectic tradition of the Mishna and the Talmud has hard-wired Hebrews into a permanent state of what is called "multiple empathic cognition."

On the one hand this - on the other hand that. 

The sad consequence of all this is that Schoffman is so paralyzed by indecision that he hasn't been able to paint a picture in over 15 years.

David Schoffman's last known completed painting. Oil on linen, 1998

His inactivity however does not occasion any sadness or regret on his part. Rather he finds in his indolence a tremendous source of comfort and an exhilarating sense of relief.

So what does he do with all his time, you may reasonably ask?

He's doing what every other person with a pulse is doing ...

He's screwing around with his laptop, his I-Phone and sharing every loose stool that comes into his ever-shrinking head on social media.