Stone cold sober.

Mental illness has been in my thoughts of late, best I don’t say why, but it has always been a diagnosis that I am not prepared to take at face value.

I believe it might be always the case that the fault lies not entirely with the patient, but also with the world in which they live.

[Potopov] went through the cannibal camps of Novograd-Volynsk and Czetochowa, where the prisoners ate grass, tree bark, and their dead comrades. The Germans suddenly removed him from this camp, and took him to Berlin, and there was a man, (a “polite bastard”) who spoke excellent Russian, who asked him if he really was Potopov, the famous engineer from the Dnieper Dam Power Station. Could he prove it by drawing — well a diagram of the system for switching on the Dnieper Dam generator? As the diagram had already been widely published Potapov had no hesitation in complying. Later he was to tell the Soviet prosecutor all about it himself — though he needn’t have said a word.

It was this that the indictment described as his “betrayal of the secrets of the Dnieper Dam Power Station”

What did not get into the indictment was the sequel to this story. Having established Potopov’s identity. the unknown Russian made him an offer: if he would sign a voluntary declaration of his willingness to work on the reconstruction of the power station, he would at once be released from camp, supplied with ration cards and money, and restored to his beloved work.

At the tempting offer, Potopov’s wrinkled face darkened thoughtfully. Without shouting his indignation, or beating his breast, or in any way staking his claim to imortality as a posthumous hero of the Soviet Union, he said in his quiet voice with its southern accent;

“But you see, I signed my oath of allegiance, If I were now to sign this, it would be in conflict with that, wouldn’t it?”

“I respect your convictions” said the unknown Russian, and sent him back to the camp.

In this mild and undramatic manner, Potopov chose almost certain death in preference to a comfortable life.

From Chapter 27 in Michael Guybon’s translation of Aleksander Solzhenitsyn’s The First Circle.

Potopov may have had various reasons for declining the offer; tribal loyalty, a sense of pride in his own straight dealing, or a strong conviction to soviet values. The author doesn’t or hasn’t yet, (I’m not half way through), deconstructed Potopov’s character to that end, and it maynot be the best example, but it is an example of a rash decision that some might label mad even though the real sickness is clearly around the character — his environment.

Looking at the outlook now for humanity, or for any individual, I see a population of 7,895,598,054 and rising, still, for the moment, and let me guess that only half are making their main concern survival and comfort, and the other half are seeking some kind of meaning to their lives — oh how I envy the first half: I don’t see how any sane person, whose existence is in any way secure, would not choose self annihilation. I believe we are all sick, as sick as our predicament and my writing this is only one, of a million symptoms.

The cure, or the sane act, when I rail against this madness, would be to put a brick through the window of the post office, and to lie down in the road and wait to be either run over or arrested. By giving up my liberty, I can enter into another world, where I can be safe from the responsibility of decision making. I can be an automata, a simple cog in a machine, I can denounce responsibility, or I can walk past the post office, go into the Coop and buy my bread for breakfast, and carry on the merry dance of insanity.

Of course there are other choices, I could direct my energy into some project or protest but it is all just delaying the inevitable. I may feel better when I’ve had my little rant on the internet, or bent the ear of a friend, but it will not last, I cannot call myself sane, whilst I continue to dance this dance.

I am, I suppose, unfortunate to be in some partial sense educated; an expensive South London school, the bbc, my parents, the church, a few books and access to the internet, but most importantly the exercise of my simple brain in discussion with other simple souls, who have themselves a varying understanding of logic. I cannot shake off education, and as one of nearly eight billion unqualified folk, I don’t stand much chance of making any difference to the madness outside. I must concentrate on my own soul and what to do with it, and hope that the whole of Penge doesn’t have the same idea as me, as the authorities seem to be quite keen on the idea of prison at the moment, and if we all insist on going there together, we’ll find conditions getting a little harsh. Wish me luck.