A Trip with Teja

[wheatencrown]

When they first step through the door, they're in the cold of France but Demeter is quiet and then steps and warm air hits them.

They're in the midst of a beautiful vineyard with a cottage visible just through the vines,

"Here we are."

Comments

[ostro_goth]

"Yes, but we only know about him through Plato and Xenophon," Teja says, "with some remarks in Aristotle and Aristophanes. So we can't really say..."

Pause.

"You probably knew him, did you?"

[wheatencrown]

"Yes, I did, dear. He wasn't as willing to get his hands muddy as Socrates was so lost for it."

[ostro_goth]

"Yes he seems to have had a problem with the physical world as a whole," Teja says, "even though that is a sweeping generalisation."

[wheatencrown]

"No, its quite true. I think its because he thought too much about his desires instead of acting on them."

[ostro_goth]

"Desires were ever a thing to be harness and reined in, for him," Teja says. "They were for me, too, but I would blame that neither on Plato nor on Christ, as most would."

[wheatencrown]

"No, simply the world you lived in and your duties constrained you so."

[ostro_goth]

"The world I lived in was much constrained by both Platonism and Christianity," Teja says, "and while I did not subscribe to their tenets, I did keep to their rules, incidentally, and thus was above reproach."

[wheatencrown]

"Yes and so you're only now learning how to pursue your own happiness and pleasure."

[ostro_goth]

"As nobody is likely to quote the bible or Plato at me with disapproval, any longer," Teja agrees.

[wheatencrown]

"No, you can quote them at yourself if you really want to."

[ostro_goth]

"You are making fun of me!" Teja says; but he is smiling.

He knows that he still lives by standards that nobody shares, not even he himself.

[wheatencrown]

"Of course I am, someone has to."

[ostro_goth]

"This journey is doing me good," Teja then says. "So many things were preying on my mind lately, not just Charlie."

[wheatencrown]

"I know, you worry too much."

[ostro_goth]

"Yes," Teja says. "I think I can change things if only I worry enough and don't stop poking at them."

[wheatencrown]

"Exactly and in the meantime, I'll make sure you laugh and blush."

[ostro_goth]

"Thank you," Teja says, a bit ruefully.