By Lida Prypchan
“That’s another contradiction,” thought Irene. She had just graduated as an historian, and the sole conclusion she had reached in five years was that history contradicts itself time and time again. “The mere fact of studying history only to come to this sorry conclusion,” she continued, somewhat dismayed, “is a serious contradiction in itself. To study how man’s irrationality has changed the course of history and then to consider how society instills rational thoughts into us, is a crazy contradiction.”
Half an hour later, she was laughing to herself.
In the midst of her laughter, she discovered a new contradiction just as inexplicable as the previous ones. To realize how absurd history is and then to laugh about it, is itself a contradiction. She lit a cigarette and, lying back with her eyes closed, thought about her childhood, visualizing all the contradictions in adults, all the contradictions in life. Finally she had arrived at a conclusion: “Life is governed by one law – the law of contradictions.”
In the first place, there’s birth. Why do we human beings cry at the moment of birth, instead of laughing? There are two possibilities: life or nothingness. Nothingness means non-existence. Its opposite is life. Faced with these two possibilities, life is undoubtedly preferable. You suffer, but you also have fun. Life is not as wonderful as we make children believe, but neither is it as worthless as skeptics would have us think. Life is a balance – or, rather, a struggle – between opposing forces: good and evil, beauty and ugliness, justice and injustice, love and hate. Life is also a contradiction in itself; contradictions are needed in order to provide a balance.
In the second place, there’s the education of children. There is a contradiction in the fact that it’s easier to construct a building than to educate a child, that there are no universities to teach how to be a mother or father, but there are universities to teach how to be an engineer or lawyer. Day after day we see the disastrous effects of a poor education and still we stand by and do nothing. From this contradiction we can deduce another, perhaps a consequence of the first, concerning how we are taught to face life. Life is presented to us through rose-colored spectacles – only kindness and beauty exist. In no way are we allowed to behold the pulsing reality of the street. Then suddenly, when we’re grown up we see it as it is and we become disillusioned. Our parents should educate us for life; by exposing us to all of life’s positive and negative aspects, by teaching us to confront what is around us with discernment, not leave us feeling defenseless. They should teach us what’s important and what is not, that the only thing we possess is within ourselves and that we are not going to find it on the outside. They should teach us that happiness, although fleeting, is a state of mind, not a lottery prize. They should teach us to think along positive ways to achieve our goals. They should teach us the advantages of being communicative and not encourage us to keep silent. They should teach us to accept ourselves and show us not to fear who we really are.
In the third place, when we are young we believe in everything and everyone. When we grow old, we turn into skeptics. This is not only contradictory, but also futile, for what good does it do us when we’re young to believe in everything, when we know nothing? And what good does it do us when we’re old to believe in nothing, when we know so much?
In the fourth place, when we finish high school at the tender age of eighteen and happen to have learnt how to add, but not how to multiply by seven or nine, we have to choose a career that will change the whole course of our lives – and if we can’t make up our minds, we are turned out on the streets to look for a job because we can’t answer questions about what we can do. If that doesn’t occur, we’re taken to a psychologist to sort ourselves out and while we’re there, they subject us to an eighty-hour test that tells whether we’re any good at putting up with bad smells and viewing human beings as if they were numbers, or whether we have a propensity for lying, or the sills to construct buildings without foundations. But never will they tell us that we were born to be artists or philosophers.
In the fifth place, universities are the repositories of the greatest contradictions. First of all, they are guided by political rather than educational motives. Consequently, the decisions are made by politicians and not by scholars. Secondly, many professors complicate subject matter with their explanations, instead of clarifying it for the students. On the other hand, sometimes the material presented during class appears very straightforward, but when exam time arrives, formulae and equations appear that you’ve never come across before in your life. Sometimes you come out of an exam sure that you failed, only to find out later that you did rather well – or vice versa. Another big contradiction is student leadership – sometimes the worst students make the best leaders. I almost omitted another very important contradiction: multiple-choice tests. For these, the answer you have to mark is the opposite of what you think. I agree strongly with Oscar Wilde’s saying that fools ask questions for which the wise man has no answer!
In the sixth place: friendship. Sometimes those you’d like to have as friends are not, and vice versa. Other times, when you value a friend very much, he doesn’t greatly value you and then when you treat him with indifference, he pursues your friendship.
I‘m not even going to mention love, because love is an inexplicable force; and it would be a contradiction to say that love is a contradiction. In all events, if it is a contradiction, I’m all for it – here’s to contradictions!
