Existentialism

 

When I was a kid, I ran with an older crowd. Well, not crowd. More on that another time. Let me just say when I was 12, I had some older friends, male. By the time I was 12, I’d already consumed a rich canon of science fiction from Wells to Asimov. I was drinking Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land when a new older friend suggested I was rotting my brain. He handed me a dog-eared copy of Albert Camus’ The Stranger.

For anyone who managed to escape high school without being subjected to this book, it’s pretty basic. A Western man murders an Arab for no apparent reason. It’s a social commentary, Camus using the framework of the story to express his observations about man and society. It’s an easy read. Even with distractions of school, family and the social order, I clocked through the manuscript in less than a week.

My scholarly friend, who wished to save my brain from rotting, asked me: “So, what do you take from the book?”

“I learned I’ll never be an existentialist.”

Even at the age of 12, getting me starry-eyed about anything was difficult. I was a tough audience, requiring all my friends and encounters to work. My scholarly friend, who reminded me of Plato in many ways (let’s wink over that) was beside himself that I did not accept his authority, edicts and mandates.

Which could explain why this adult sought to befriend children and not people his own age, but that’s yet again another story.

Yesterday, I was musing over events at work. I made a comment: “It seems stupidity always gets its way.” Oh, what a wonderful comment! I goggled it.

It’s a quotation from Albert Camus.

Yesterday, April 26, 2011, after 45 years, I finally admitted the truth.

I’m an existentialist.

And, maybe always have been.