A Conversation With A Scottish Hippie

Does the title say everything? A scruffy drunk man that makes one think of William Wallace when he opens his mouth? Yes, well almost.

This past Saturday I attended a music workshop presented by David Chislett. It all took place at the Mystic Boer club in Bloemfontein and towards the end of the afternoon locals started getting their Saturday night moods warmed up. On my way out I sat down to talk to some old friends and meet some new people, some general socialising before heading home. After about twenty minutes of proverbial conversation we were joined by a bizarre looking man with an accent that stuck out like a sore thumb.

I would judge him to have been in his late 40's. He had medium length black hair, which I presume he had dyed because of the grey poking out at the roots. His face was shadowed with a two day old beard which seemed to compliment the rest of his attire; a loose fitted denim shirt, green cargo trousers, and a number of charm bracelets on his wrist. He introduced himself as Shaun, "the same as Connery but different".

Being someone who finds an interest to things foreign I asked whether or not, based on his accent, he was Scottish. His response set the tone for the rest of the evening. "What gave you that idea?", he said with sour bite of sarcasm.

Shortly after that I found myself wanting to leave after everyone but Shaun and myself were sitting across from each other. He persuaded me to stay as I had no real excuse to leave at the time. I found myself staying, basking in the awkwardness of an hour long conversation with this self proclaimed hippie who painted for a living. Unfortunately I don't take kindly to sarcasm and bad wit, and this man was spewing it all over the place. I wasn't in the mood for deep and intellectual conversations about life and humanity, he was. This means that whenever I tried to speak I couldn't put my words together properly and stumbled over myself awkwardly, looking like a blithering simpleton. Paraphrasing a long story short, this is mostly what he had to say:

• Humans are alive to destroy each other
• If you come to realise it, you are the most important person of your 'maker'.
• My ideas for writing are fairly pointless and have been done before. 

He has obviously had a lot of time to put his thoughts in order and can back up whatever he says with intellectual philosophy and experience. I found the experience as a whole a bit patronising and degrading, not the most comfortable place to be in on what should have been a relaxing weekend. Although his arguments had some good nihilistic grounding (which he felt was purely realism), I really don't see the point of such a fatalistic view of life. Negativity spreads like wild wire, and I believe existence needs meaning which you create.

I will however quote him with something a little more hopeful, which he somehow threw into his twisted view of life:
"Love absolutely, and care continuously."

Still unsure about this situation, I guess you never know what types of people will spark off a dull moment of intellectual sterilty...