A Mawmag's Dream

By Sigge S. Amdal © 2007

I was flirting, no, I was dancing with my own future's certain death. And why? There was no love to speak of. Love can come later in some cases, I know, but if there's nothing, no great emotion to ride on – why on earth was I still dancing?

It was the thought, the simple idea of love, family, laughter, whatever all of it is; the purpose of life, from a rational point of view. But I'm not rational, as here demonstrated, and I have other purposes. Greater purpose befalls man like sunrays lick the life of our planet; it engulfs everything and belittles what other sources of light you encounter along the path.

I shall not shit on that idea, but no less should I think of life as either-or, there will be more women, more emotions and one day, who knows, love too. Whatever happens, I have shit to do. And when you can make a difference, because you have an impact, the choice has already chosen you.

What a ramble.

As I mused on this, on my idle walk among the varied exotic trees in the bowels of the botanical garden I wondered, sniffed after the memory of having done all of this before. The impact, the doubts, the truly sweet dreams, the confusion, the confessions and the same particular questions. I couldn't remember, although it certainly felt like it.

You see I have the short-term memory of a Philippine prosimian primate called Mawmag. A very small, very quick tree-dwelling monkey with huge eyes that make it look like it's trapped in a somewhat constant state of totally dumbfounding surprise.

"Whoa! That tree wasn't there five minutes ago!"

"Shit. What do you know?! I have hands! Excellent. Let's climb the tree."

"Uh oh. Where did the tree go?"

"Check out the hands! And a jungle! Whoa! That tree wasn’t there five minutes ago!"

Several Paris-dwelling original surrealists in the peripheral circle surrounding Breton invoked a continuous life of surprise, some restrained to the mere fantastical arrangements of objects, which certainly empowered the frequency of artistic impressions but seriously degraded the continuation of an already fragmented memory, or, the validity of memory perceived to be. Choice or chosen, the result's the same in all its richness, except the Mawmag can catch birds mid air, a feat ascribed but a handful of surrealists.

Life surprises me like trees in the jungle. I move rapidly between branches, whistling a tune I thought that I heard somewhere, only to stop suddenly! Perplexed and dumbfounded at the sight of a new orchid. Or one I saw five minutes ago without noticing. Or one I forgot I had already noticed.

I sit down at one of the benches overlooking the giant step formations above the Edvard Munch museum, and I light a cigarette. Every five minutes of my life involves a bench, a sunset and a cigarette. And often the feeling that it would be nice meeting someone nice. No more weaklings, players or poseurs, please. I peer through the evening clouds to the last rays of sun that reflect wholly artificial in the yellow paint of giant construction site insects around the new opera house. How would a Mawmag monkey deal with the situation?

I swiftly scan the area.

It certainly would be up in one of those trees. I look down, and what the hell! I have hands! With the overcoming feeling of great purpose and adventure I undertake the relatively dangerous journey up on of the smaller trees until I'm almost settled in, next to the noisy nest of a magpie family. Almost.

At one critical point of the journey I miss my grip and fall down.

Next thing I can remember, I'm lying on my back and a female jogger with white earplugs is standing next to me. From where I'm lying she's pretty nice.

"Are you all right?"

I wait until my lungs have breath to spare, and I smile: "Sure! I'm a mawmag monkey!"

She smiles back.

"You sure are."

All of a sudden I'm walking home with a new melody stuck on forth verse between the space of my ears, with a brand new phone number in my pocket, and for some reason that I cannot rightly comprehend I’m walking with a limp.

The perceptive reader may have noticed by now that the original voice and storytelling of the dignified, reflecting monologue this all began with somehow faded away and disappeared. And the perceptive reader is right. The original voice was heard to wander off into the woods mumbling something about bass fishing and greater purpose. And if you aren't satisfied with that, you might as well join him, because you must be a serious person and there is nothing more serious than bass fishing with a purpose.

... I mean, come on, what did you expect? I'm a monkey, for crying out loud.

I don't have any morals. What do you know? I have hands!


Sigge S. Amdal is a word wanker from Oslo, Norway.