Black Milk - Elif Shafak [26]
Her handbags are cluttered sacks, where she fits in several books, notebooks and all sorts of knickknacks. She usually doesn’t wear makeup, not because she is against it but because when she puts a mascara or lipstick in her handbag, she can never find it again.
Miss Highbrowed Cynic is following an alternative diet nowadays. She has a plate of organic spinach, organic zucchini and some kind of mixed vegetables with saffron in front of her. She is a staunch vegetarian on the verge of turning vegan. It has been years since she last ate meat. Or chicken. Or fish. She claims that when we consume an animal, we also consume their fear of death. Apparently that is the reason we get sick. Instead, we are meant to eat peaceful leafy greens, such as spinach, lettuce, kale, arugula . . .
“Hello, Miss Highbrowed Cynic,” I say.
“Peace, Sister,” she says, waving her hand nonchalantly.
“I need to pick your brain on an important matter,” I say.
“Well, you came to the right place. I am brains.”
“Okay, what is your opinion about motherhood?”
“What is the use of asking rhetorical questions when it is a well-known fact that everyone hears only what they want to hear,” she says. “Wittgenstein wrote about the limits of language for a reason. You ought to read the Tractatus.”
“I don’t have time to read the Tractatus,” I say. “Ms. Agaoglu is still in the living room waiting for an answer. You’ve got to help me now.”
“Well, then, I urge you to think about the word envy.”
“Come again?”
“Envy is not a simple emotion, mind you, but a deep philosophical dilemma. It is so important, in fact, that it shapes world history. Jean-Paul Sartre said all sorts of racism and xenophobia stem from envy.”
“I am afraid I don’t get a word of what you are saying. Could you please speak more plainly?”
“All right, let me put it in simple terms: The grass is always greener on the other side.”
“Which means?”
“It means if you have a baby, you will always be envious of women who don’t have children and focus fully on their careers. If you choose to focus on your career, however, you will always envy women who have kids. Whichever path you choose, your mind will be obsessed with the option you have discarded.”
“Is there no way out of this dilemma?” I ask.
She shakes her head desolately. “Envy lies at the root of our existential angst. Look at the history of mankind, all the wars and destruction. Do you know what they said when World War I broke out? The war that will end all wars! Of course that is not what happened. The wars didn’t end because there is no equality and no justice. Instead we have an imbalance of power and income, ethnic and religious clashes. . . . All of this is bound to generate new conflicts.”
I take a long, deep breath. “You are making me depressed.”
“You ought to be depressed,” she says, wagging a finger in my face. “To live means to be saddled with melancholy. It is no coincidence that Paul Klee painted the Angel of History so lonely and hopeless. Remember the look on the face of Angelus Novus. I highly recommend that you read Walter Benjamin on . . .”
“You are making me soooo depressed,” I interject.
She stares at me as if seeing me for the first time. “Oh, I see. In the age of Internet and multimedia, no one has the time or patience for in-depth knowledge anymore. All right, I will cut to the chase.”
“Please.”
“My point is, whichever woman you will grow into, you will wish to be the Other. According to the great French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, the essence of ethics is the point where you come face-to-face with the Other. Of course, from a phenomenological stance,