Ninety-nine

I live like a hermit, rereading the books in my library rather than reading newer books or having conversations with other people. Not because I’m shy and/or have nothing interesting to say, but because they – the other people and/or the newer books - have nothing to say that I haven’t heard and/or read before.

Learning what I think interests me more than learning what they think, because they don't think.  

People seem to find me interesting, and start conversations with me. I can’t remember ever having had a conversation, or a relationship, that I started. Other people have always started them, and I’ve responded because I hoped they’d prove interesting. But as I got to know them, I’ve always found they have nothing interesting to tell me, nothing to teach me.

Not only do I know more than they do; I know them better than they know themselves. And the effort I must make to keep from telling them what they don’t want to know eventually becomes more than the relationship is worth to me. I want real companionship, not based on deception.

I know, from reading their books, that there are interesting people in the world, people who know more than I do; but they don’t live in my part of the world.

I used to tell myself that, were I to meet the authors of these books, I’d find them disappointing because people always put the best of themselves into their books; but I know, from experience, that this is true only of the authors of mediocre books. A book is only one part of its author, but not always the best part.

I don’t like people. I love them. More than they love themselves, judging from their fear of knowing themselves. I expect better of them than they expect of themselves, and forgive them for things they can’t forgive themselves. But I can’t forgive them for lying, to me or to themselves, because they only harm themselves.