Chapter 17

I’m torn today between writing about what is really important, or what only seems really important. Several weeks ago, I saw a show on (I think) the Learning Channel about the biological basis of pleasure, and the consequences of the pursuit for pleasure at all costs. Also, we are involved in wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. In the short term, this is obviously a problem, both in the real world, and in this novel - because, after all, Michel is the right age to be drafted, and though I had not planned on this being a war novel, since I am following the events of 2011 in helping to construct this novel, it could very well become one.

But wars are temporary, sporadic. The problem of pleasure is something that will be with us always, something which we have to deal with every day. The show I watched talked about addicted gamblers and addicted athletes, both of whom overdo their gambling or exercising for the pleasure it brings - the gamblers through losing (surprise, it’s not winning that keep gamblers gambling, but losing!) and the athletes through pushing themselves until they feel pain, causing the body to produce morphine-like chemicals called endorphins that bring pleasure to the body. However, none of these characters are gamblers, nor do any of them exercise excessively. I don’t see Michel as the exercising type.

But each of these people are interested in maximizing their own pleasure, some more than others. Sarah finds her pleasure in writing -- secondarily through sex, if she has a competent lover. Michel is interested in both sex and writing in equal measure. Freud would say Michel’s writing was a manifestation of his sexual desire, and for Michel, I could see how Freud would be right. Since he cannot have sex quite as often as he would like -- despite having sex with two different women -- he has to release his sexual tension in other ways. He chose to do it through his writing. As a chronic dreamer, writing seemed the most obvious choice, since he could create his dreams on paper. Jackie’s search for pleasure is almost exclusively sexual, as is Pat’s and Jessie’s. But Jackie’s differs from Pat’s and Jessie’s, who are both sex addicts (much like Donna's friend Maddy, making this another strange episode of fact mirroring fiction), in that she, like Michel, has found an outlet for her sexual energies in her academic work. Her source of pleasure is in discovery.

To follow Jackie through her day is to follow peaks of pleasure chemicals flowing through her body. Jackie wakes most mornings horny, and so goes into the living room to wake Michel, pulling back the bed covers, telling him to wake up and go take a piss so he can fuck her. Michel never objects, just complies.

After cleaning herself up after sex, she makes breakfast. She loves cooking, loves the work, the smells, the slow taste of things as she tries what she’s making, making sure it tastes just right. She makes enough for both her and Michel, not because she particularly cares if he eats, but because she’s making something anyway, and it’s just as easy to make for two as for one.

A warm shower after breakfast brings pleasure to her skin, the warm water rolling over her, the gentle sting of water shooting in small streams at her, the joy of feeling clean.

One of the few things she dislikes is getting dressed. Were it up to her, she would go everywhere naked, out in public, to the store, to restaurants. She doesn’t because it’s illegal. She wonders why it is obscene to show her breasts, but not for men to show theirs. The only difference is in size and, occasionally, the amount of hair on the men’s chests. She wonders what is obscene about the female body -- she finds it beautiful, curvaceous. She understands why painters want to paint women. There is nothing more beautiful in nature. She finds it a shame there are people who find something so beautiful obscene.

After dressing, she goes to class. She loves learning, sits in rapt attention, leaning forward, as if proximity to the teacher could make her learn more. After class, she goes to the library, reads articles, learns more than the teacher teaches, learns the latest advances, cannot wait to see the professor in two days to tell him he was wrong.

After lunch, another time of joyful cooking, she returns to the biology department to do her research. She is trying to prove triple-stranded DNA is used biologically for gene regulation. At first, she was discouraged from doing this work by a professor who did not believe triple-stranded DNA actually existed in the cell, since it required such a low pH to be created in the test tube, but when she read an article that said antibodies were used to show the existence of triple-stranded DNA in cells, and another that showed triple-stranded DNA could be made in a pH of 7.0, close to the pH of the cell, through the use of high concentrations of magnesium, she decided to do the project anyway. The professor, who was being contrary to get a rise out of her as much as anything, was happy to let her do her project, warning her he would be her harshest critic. She told him that would only ensure her work would be as close to perfect as possible. Her research gave her the dual pleasures found in the search for knowledge and in the potential of proving someone wrong who was more educated and more experienced.

After spending most of her day in the lab, she went home and, on weekdays, did homework. On weekends, though, she goes to bars, enjoying an occasional beer, the loud music, the feel of men brushing against her, flirting with her, touching her. She loves picking up men, hoping they want to sleep with her that night, rarely disappointed, the smoke and haze and beer gaze making men try to pick up any woman -- let alone someone as pretty as Jackie. Some shy away from her with her tattoos and piercings, but others are even more attracted, men she would rather go out with anyway. The beer brings on a lightheadedness that is pleasant, fun. The thrill of the hunt adds to that -- the potential for sex only more so, even more than the sex itself sometimes. On those weekends, she ends the day with the pleasant feel of someone’s arms around her, holding her with a comfortable warmth that makes her feel secure. On weekdays, she hopes Michel doesn’t have a date with Sarah, so she can have sex with him before she goes to bed.

This is what Jackie’s days are like, excepting the occasional surprise or impulse, which also bring Jackie pleasure, since she loves the unexpected and embraces change. To Jackie, life is joy, pleasure, the most wonderful thing that could exist. She has a joy in existence Michel, or even Sarah, who also loves life, though she doesn’t celebrate it like Jackie does, cannot understand. Perhaps that is why she and Michel broke up, why they could not work together as a couple. Michel spent too much time complaining about life, while Jackie spent too much time (in his opinion) loving it.