Alphonse
Usually on rainy days like this I prefer to take advantage of the coolness and sleep. Grab a blanket, go into foetal position, and go into the darkness of slumber. Like a cocoon. Waking up, I would have sprouted wings to fly in the freshness of the new day.
Today, however, I felt like going to the common room where the piano is. I didn't plan to play it; to me, the rain sounds like an orchestra in itself, a harmonious cacophony. That is an oxymoron, but it is not to me. Somehow I can accept that order can arise from chaos. That something can arise from nothing.
So there was I, sitting by the large window, listening to the pitter-patter melody, daydreaming. If no two drops of rain are alike then no two sounds are alike. The strumming of a guitar, the hammer hitting the piano string, the plucking of the harp, the vibration of the violin string: say, all are playing A, that is frequency of 440 Hertz, do they sound the same? Obviously not. That is because they don't produce a singular peak at 440, but each is a sum of several frequencies, peaking at 440. So timbre is like the uniqueness of a sound. Like a name. Splash sound, trickling sound, pouring sound, gurgling sound.
Jake can make the tremolo sound using the piano (which I cannot produce). His nimble finger would fall in quick succession one after another. The notes then become overlapped over one another; coming out as a trill. It sounds like a gentle rain. Warm in certain way. Cool in another way.
I remember my teacher who taught about oxymoron and paradox. "Contradictory but not contradictory -- oxymoron and paradox are paradoxes in themselves." His saying of this stuck. Oxymoron is an exhibitionist. It blatantly display its contrasting words. Paradox is shy. It hides its contradiction under layers of words. Perhaps it is 'sly'; well, it is only one-letter difference. In any case, those contrasting words or ideas are not really contradictory, because they belong to different contexts. Imagine that they belong to different planes -- we can find a common plane where they can co-exist, where they are co-planar.
But I digress. Contradictory. Aren't we all?
We are full of contradictions. Some are obscene like oxymorons, or morons, that will do also; some are discreet like paradoxes.
Usually on rainy days like this I prefer to take advantage of the coolness and sleep. Grab a blanket, go into foetal position, and go into the darkness of slumber. Like a cocoon. Waking up, I would have sprouted wings to fly in the freshness of the new day.
Today, however, I felt like going to the common room where the piano is. I didn't plan to play it; to me, the rain sounds like an orchestra in itself, a harmonious cacophony. That is an oxymoron, but it is not to me. Somehow I can accept that order can arise from chaos. That something can arise from nothing.
So there was I, sitting by the large window, listening to the pitter-patter melody, daydreaming. If no two drops of rain are alike then no two sounds are alike. The strumming of a guitar, the hammer hitting the piano string, the plucking of the harp, the vibration of the violin string: say, all are playing A, that is frequency of 440 Hertz, do they sound the same? Obviously not. That is because they don't produce a singular peak at 440, but each is a sum of several frequencies, peaking at 440. So timbre is like the uniqueness of a sound. Like a name. Splash sound, trickling sound, pouring sound, gurgling sound.
Jake can make the tremolo sound using the piano (which I cannot produce). His nimble finger would fall in quick succession one after another. The notes then become overlapped over one another; coming out as a trill. It sounds like a gentle rain. Warm in certain way. Cool in another way.
I remember my teacher who taught about oxymoron and paradox. "Contradictory but not contradictory -- oxymoron and paradox are paradoxes in themselves." His saying of this stuck. Oxymoron is an exhibitionist. It blatantly display its contrasting words. Paradox is shy. It hides its contradiction under layers of words. Perhaps it is 'sly'; well, it is only one-letter difference. In any case, those contrasting words or ideas are not really contradictory, because they belong to different contexts. Imagine that they belong to different planes -- we can find a common plane where they can co-exist, where they are co-planar.
But I digress. Contradictory. Aren't we all?
We are full of contradictions. Some are obscene like oxymorons, or morons, that will do also; some are discreet like paradoxes.
2 comments:
--rexy--
It seems like Alphone is quite philosophical=)
The point is -- since Alphonse talks about paradoxes -- there is contradictions in Alphonse himself. Jake's impression of him and his inner consciousness don't really match when juxtaposed like this. That Alphonse himself is an embodied paradox is an important clue.
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