The Producer
By: Lee Thomas Penn
-Son of-
Thomas Lee Penn
Professor
Burroughs was sitting in his office, thinking frantically.
Napoleon doing an interpretative dance in a
blue leotard. French soldiers marching to Caribbean steel drums…. Through a pineapple
farm. Yes, and then: ‘How now, Fraü Cow?’
He sat with his eyes closed, letting the spider-like machine on
his scalp digest his ideas and transmit them to the University Hub, where grad
students sorted out the valuable ideas from the invaluable. The machine was
made to look like a turtle with felt and rubber so as to appear less
intimidating (one of Dr. Burroughs’s many ideas), but it still felt like a
spider underneath.
Paintings
melting in a fire – new art? New movement with beatniks in flaming berets and
fireproof coffee houses. Espresso – tired! – tires made of chocolate leaving
dripping skid marks. Wait… Yes, espresso.
Dr. Burroughs opened his eyes and pressed a button on the
touchscreen next to his easy chair. He closed his eyes again to think. The wall
unit whirred and screeched and hissed and sent forth a double macchiato on the
conveyor belt. Dr. Burroughs grabbed it without opening his eyes and sipped.
Tired.
Tired of music is different from tired of sex is different from tired of hiking
is different from tried and true, all-American, is different from not-tired of
sleep. Exhaust from a train engine kills the zinnias, turns the rain to saliva,
digesting roof tiles and soil nutrients and train brake pads, turns the bodies
in the train into burning flesh when the train crashes, charring hair and blood
running through my brain, oh God, rest, need to rest…
Dr. Burroughs removed the turtle from his head and massaged his
temples. He breathed deeply and shuddered once through his arms.
He thought about nothing for a
while, and it felt good. But it was a sour kind of pleasure.
You’ve
got to keep thinking, you’re taking so many rests, it all will pay off in the
future, it is exciting, you are great, this is what you wanted…
Producing, always thinking, it’s a chore, it is too much…
After some minutes, Dr. Burroughs
opened his eyes and slugged back the rest of his drink, which had by now
cooled. He shifted his legs, put the turtle back on his head, and resumed
thinking.
A
complete restructuring of Chile’s economy around Communism and toffee made with
llama milk, ‘Moving forward, one sugary brick at a time!’ Hmm… No, !A tierra
con capitalismo! Propaganda posters with llamas stomping on American-made dark
chocolates, perhaps even the Nobel Peace Prize…
Dr. Burroughs opened his eyes and stared at the door to his
office. He heard the knock again. He cleared his throat.
“Come in,” he said.
The door opened, and in walked Dr.
Mathews, the head of the Psychology department and Dr. Burroughs’s supervisor.
Dr. Burroughs could feel a slight dampness seep into his armpits.
“Good day, Peter,” said Dr. Mathews
curtly. “No, no, don’t get up. In fact, I want you to keep thinking. I have
just a few things to say to you, and it won’t take long. Frankly, you can’t
afford not to be thinking right now.”
Dr. Burroughs closed his eyes.
Thinking…
Um… Shit… The mind is like a muscle, it can be trained, it can be strengthened,
it can be used up, it can refresh, it can keep going past it’s limits, it can
be used to attract a mate, it can build, it can tear down… ‘Why, sometimes I’ve
thought up as many as 600 impossible things before breakfast…’
“You’ve been taking a lot of breaks,
Peter. This time, you were only thinking for two hours before taking a break.”
Dr. Burroughs could hear Dr. Mathews pacing around his office. “I just want to
make sure that you’re okay, make sure that we’re on the same page here.”
A
man, brown loafers, sport coat with pretentious elbow patches,
left-right-left-right, staring at the lamp that was my father’s, touching the
lampshade – soft scratch – left-right-left-right, a one-way discourse between
colleagues, a one-way trial, Kafka, Koestler, Camus, Dostoyevsky, Hugo…
“Peter, you’re one of the best. You’re ideas are brilliant. You’re
students love you. In fact, I’m not afraid to admit that I’m jealous.”
Mohammad
Ali in a boxing match with a rodeo clown, a glancing blow here, a miss there,
and uh-oh, there’s the barrel…
“But we’re a top-tier university, Peter. There’s a reason why our professors are
assigned to think for five minutes longer than any other university.” He
sighed. “Your numbers are down, Peter, and I know that you’ve been thinking a
statistically significant amount of… other thoughts. Bad thoughts. Thoughts
about how long the hours are and how demanding the work is.” Dr. Mathews
stopped next to the touch screen and pressed a button. “Here, have some
espresso.”
A cup with a double shot of espresso
and hazelnut flavoring came rolling out from the wall unit.
A
woman who is addicted to eating lipstick with permanently red teeth scares an
entire second-grade class when she goes to pick her son up. Tell me, how does
this inform our debate on Nature Vs. Nurture? Questions? Comments? Traumatic
childhood experiences? Anyone?
“We’re a better class of people,
Peter. We’ve worked hard to get to where we are, and we can’t through that away.
We’re above digging ditches and stocking shelves at the supermarket. Our
families deserve better than that kind of life – never forget that.”
What
would Patricia think if I were to
quit? Gender roles, new woman, sex is a bartering chip, love is free, love is
conditional, money is not important if you have it, each situation is
subjective, multiple possibilities constrained by fear and habit:
‘I love you, Honey, and I’m
trust that you’re making the right decision, I have a surprise for you – it’s a
new motorcycle,’
-Or-
‘It’s all so sudden… Aren’t
you being a little rash, Peter?’
-Or-
‘What the fuck are we
supposed to do now, Peter?! This is the last straw! We’re over! Oh, and I’m
sleeping with Paul from art class – we use body paints, and he touches me like
you never could!’
“I know that it’s hard, Peter. I
know. But, you’ve got so much promise, and we’d hate to lose you. Though we know
these phases pass, we see you slipping, and so we get nervous – can you blame
us for that? We just want you to keep up the good work, to have the right
perspective. No one’s forcing you to stay on at our university, but, honestly,
what else can thinkers like us do?”
Patricia
and I wake up at 5:00am, brew a pot of tea, and walk downstairs to our bakery.
Patty kneads the dough mixed the night before, while I construct the pastries
and cook down the fruit preserves. We make the best cheese Danishes in town.
We’re working, and I notice that Patty’s got some flour on her cheek, and she
catches me looking at her, and she blushes a deep red while teasing me with an
are-you-seriously-thinking-about-that
batting of her eyelashes. And we talk,
God damn it. We talk. Talk about travel plans and book club and how our son is
doing in elementary school. When we finally set out the baked goods, it’s time
to open up shop, but we keep one of our regular customers, Mrs. Jones, waiting
outside because Patty just looks so God damn cute with that flour on her face
and we need ten minutes to violate a health code or two in the back just like
when we were first dating…
Dr. Burroughs felt a hand on his
shoulder, which made him wince.
“You’re so close to tenure, Peter.”
I
can actually hear the concern in his voice. Poor old man with sagging elbow
patches and sallow cheeks, scared because this is all that he knows, and what
would he think if I didn’t validate his worldview? Would he think it was all a
waste? Would he cry? Would he die? Would he care at all? What do I know? Who
will validate my own worldview? Do I really like this? Will my choice be for
me? Will my choice be for others? Is any choice wholly one’s own?
Dr. Mathews lifted his hand from his shoulder.
“You’re going to think great
thoughts, Peter. You’re the best. That’s all that I’ve come to say. Don’t
forget to drink your espresso, and here – eat something.” With that, he pressed
another button on the touchscreen and left.
A plate of cheese Danishes came rolling out on the conveyor belt.
A half hour, Dr. Mathews watched from his office window as Dr.
Burroughs went scurrying across the lawn toward the parking lot. Dr. Burroughs
had a box of personal items underneath each arm.
Dr. Mathews smiled sadly.
“Atta boy, Peter,” he whispered to
the pane of glass. “Go find your own happiness.”
He turned away and paced around the
room, mumbling to himself. Then, he ordered a glass of steamed milk and donned
his turtle.
It
is known that what is commonly referred to as ‘reverse psychology’ can be a
very effective coercion tool, if used properly. The problem is that most
individuals do not use it properly or
use it in the wrong situation. I propose the following necessary antecedents
for the effective use of reverse psychology. To begin, it is a basic instinct
in all people to favor a particular decision or way of thinking because it is
familiar. Thus, (1) making the flaws of a familiar decision or way of thinking
more salient will encourage the subject to change his or her mind. This is not
always possible in direct discourse because of defense mechanisms in the
subject, such as denial. Therefore, (2) the coercion must be carried out subtly,
or underneath the subject’s conscious awareness. Common techniques include
exaggeration, manipulation of in-group/out-group bias, lying, and many others.
This is the most known characteristic of reverse psychology and also the key
junction at which most attempts fail. This is because coercive dialogue alone
accounts for only about 10% of reverse-psychology effectiveness. When the
attempter has acquired (3) a thorough understanding of the subject’s thought
process (which is now more available thanks to recent advances in conscious
thought sharing), the effectiveness jumps to about 20%. An understanding of the
subject’s thought process will allow the attempter to both identify the flaws
that will have the greatest impact on the subject’s familiar decision or way of
thinking and also identify recurring reasons why the alternative decision or
way of thinking will be desirable. Acquiring this information can take from
weeks to months. This leads to the final and greatest contributing components
of successful reverse psychology: (4) the subject, at some level, has to want
the alternative and (5) has to make the
change in decision him-or-herself. Reverse psychology, in this way, is similar
to hypnosis, in which the subject will not perform an action in the trance
state that the subject does not want to do.
Taken together, reverse psychology is a technique used to
help a subject to choose an alternative that he or she has already chosen but
cannot accept. It is a nudge in the direction that the subject wants to go but
won’t for whatever reason. Reverse psychology makes the subject think that the
decision is his or her idea because it is his or her idea.
Still, the final decision to act will
always lie with the subject and cannot be foreseen despite advances in
conscious thought sharing. Therefore, the outcomes of reverse psychology are
not fully predictable at this time, and further research is required. Practical
implications for counseling merit investigation.
Professor Mathews sighed a contented sigh and sipped his steamed
milk.
It’s
Spring Break, and Jean Piaget and Anna Freud are wrestling nude in a pool of
laundry detergent, while the Anthropology Department goes bobbing for preserved
humanoid eyeballs, and his own mother jumps through five, no six!... Six hoops
of fire on a motorcycle, and all of the professors ban together and take off
their respective sport coats with the elbow patches and high heels and burn
those dreadful student essays in a large bonfire and sing Kumbayah... Kumbayah…
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