Every event has a cause. For every one thing a thing happens in succession. Except the world, if you regard the world as an event but maybe not. The world is not really an event, just a thing in itself. Unless if it is God, if you believe in God then you might argue the point, God caused the world. Or if God is the cause. So the world is His effect. Take away God and that is the world, what happens to it? Gone.
These are things you would say. I loved the subject, if you would call it a subject. The great thing about philosophy is that it is actual life, it is hardly a subject at all. Some treated it as a subject and that was their downfall; they might score good marks in class but true understanding would not come from that form of study. Okay they might get good results but beyond that no.
Eric would have been good at philosophy. Harder for Celia. She went her own way and at a certain point there has to be the way, if only as a beginning. Once you begin go where you want but let us begin from that same point, if you can find it. That is the trouble, but if you do find it then it becomes the whole world. Or the whole world becomes, it is just there and all alive. It is marvellous. That was Descartes, what a hero! He was the one we were given and you just felt lucky, imagine it was Hobbes or Locke, you would just shudder.
I could not imagine Celia and Eric ever meeting. They were both aliens. She would not fit into his world and neither would he in hers. Yet they were both mine. His world was my world before leaving Glasgow. A woman like Celia could not exist in Glasgow. Perhaps she could but I could not imagine it. Or a guy like Eric Semple at university down south. I could never imagine that either. People would not understand him. It was a separate brand of humour. You saw things differently; your whole way of thinking. Almost like it was disconnected. Eric could have gone to a Scottish university, although maybe not Edinburgh, and never St Andrews. Never an English one.
It was class. I did not show my class but Eric did. This is what it was. My dad spoke about it; to him it was everything. It explained everything. He believed in Karl Marx. Rob Anderson did not disagree with my father on that. In his opinion the academics underrated Marx as a ‘thinker’. They said he was not ‘first rate’. Some were ‘first rate’. In philosophy only the ‘first rate’ mattered. But even there, you would not find him on any syllabus. Rob thought it disgraceful. He found it salient the way they ignored Marx and others from a different culture or background. Even Jean-Paul Sartre and the Germans. The academics stayed with their own people and kept others out.
But what was striking about the Glasgow bus home, right at that minute in time, and you noticed it immediately, and you could not help but notice, that everybody, every last person on the entire bus, each single solitary one was Scottish, they all had accents and were ordinary accents; none was posh. The woman next to me as well, she did not smile or even look at me but I knew. I did not find it relaxing; I do not think I did. I was the same as them but on the other hand was I? Maybe I was not. And what if there were others in a similar situation? It was like we were each one of us disconnected, each one of us, until we were on the bus home, and starting to become Scottish again, Scottish working class. My father would have said that, never to forget it, because they would never allow it.
It was a peculiar thing altogether. Once Rob Anderson came to the pub with some of us and we had a few beers. He was saying stuff and making people laugh. He said to me when no one else was listening that I should be careful, there were those who would not wish me well. He came from a town in Yorkshire and said it happened to him. He was resigned to it. He could reach a stage but not progress further, because of his background. He said he had a Yorkshire accent. You would hear it if you listened. But he was proud of Yorkshire, very much so, and enjoyed sports, especially cricket and rugby. Those were the two most popular, by far. It was hard to find even one football fan. I asked Rob which team he supported but he only said he had a soft spot for them all if they were Yorkshire, Yorkshire teams. But what if it was Sheffield United and Sheffield Wednesday? He just smiled when I said that. So I knew he did not really bother; you cannot have two sides if they are rivals; either one or none but not two.
I missed playing football. There were teams at uni, including five-a-sides, but I did not know guys who played. I could find out and was going to.
But what Rob said about the other academics was interesting. Celia did not know him but thought he must have been bitter to think that way. She was dubious. Under his influence I would be ripe for paranoia. That is what she said. But I watched other academics; they rarely spoke to students, even to say hullo. It happened to me at the end of second term, in the same lift as my sociology tutor and he did not look at me. Yet he knew fine well that I was in his tutorial group. I did not care. But it was weird. My father said nothing but he agreed with me, I know he did. Mum did not. She did not believe they were intentionally rude. Mum thought the best of people. Dad hated hearing about them. Be the best at your lessons son, then they cannot ignore you. That was what he said, then went back to his newspaper.
Maybe it was true. But I was not the best at my lessons. I soon found that out. I did not tell mum and dad. I did not tell them everything; especially dad, it was easier with mum. But when I told her things they would reach him sooner or later. The same if I told my young sister, she would tell mum and mum would tell dad. Family politics, that was how it worked in mine.
I was looking forward to going home. I had been back at Christmas but only a few days. I returned to England the day before New Year and it caused bother. Mum got upset because of it and did not come out her bedroom when I was leaving. But there was no bus on New Year’s day so it was either wait or go the day before. It was not as if I did not enjoy being there, of course I did, and seeing everybody, it was great.
My life had changed so much. Probably it would be harder to communicate now than it had been at Christmas, and Christmas had not been easy. But that was life. And my own fault for not coming home before that. Mum was right to be hurt. She was hurt. Dad was hurt too but acted as if he was not. My sister told me. But what was I supposed to do? It was difficult. I would have failed all my essays if I had not worked through the holiday period. I was not brilliant. They thought I was but I knew I was not. Some were. I was not. In school I was but not down there.
Oh but not even in school, I was not brilliant, I could just answer everything and do it all but that was our school, an ordinary school, not like theirs down south; their parents paid a fortune, more than my father earned in a year. That is true. It was him told me but it was correct what he said. I was in the low half down there whereas up home I was top or else near the top. They were completely different down south. Most of them were clever but the brilliant ones really were brilliant. That was their good luck.
I liked being there when they were all away, especially in the library and finding places tucked away, wee study corners. I flew through my essays, it was great. I did not know Celia at that time. Imagine I did and she had not gone home! if it had just been the two of us, if she had stayed at uni, jeesoh, ye think of that, except the essays, that was the silly thing, I would have missed the deadlines or else done hopeless. Just seeing her all the time, if I could. But she would not anyway. I only saw her when she wanted; sometimes not for a week. More than a week. We had not had sex for eighteen days. One week she had not been there so that does not count but the other days she was. Unless it was her period. I did not think it was. Eighteen days. I did not see her all the time. But she liked sex.