BRUCE

what is it with the universe and endless repetition? why this endless duplication, of people, fruit flies, of stars, black holes and galaxies? i can’t get my head around it.

i remember bruce bacon, a kid i went to junior high school with who wound up at RISD in the same class as me. he was a terrible painter, a terrible drawer that everyone kept rooting for anyway. something about him made us all yearn for him to succeed. and when he did, finally, with an oil portrait that was really great, we were beside ourselves with excitement and relief. ‘so now you know you can do it!’ i said with great enthusiasm. he looked at me with a combination of flatness and an expression of philosophical ennui. ‘isn’t that great?’ i said, my forehead furrowing slightly. 'your reward is that you can keep going, brucey; this is just the first one.’ ‘why would i do that?’ he said. ‘i’ll never do that again. i proved i can do it. i’m done.’ ‘you’re not serious’ i said, slightly astonished. but looking at him i saw that he seemed to be.

he committed suicide soon after. 

so maybe you think he was crazy. maybe he was, by the usual definition. but maybe there is just a way of seeing things different than the way we seem to be collectively seeing things.