At the Border.
The line at passport control was long, but I’d been through it before. I stepped forward, handed my passport to the officer, and answered the routine questions as if they were syllogisms.
Officer: “Purpose of visit?”
Me: “Tourism. Ten days. Staying at the Carlton.”
He scanned, took my photo, and waved me through in less than half a minute.
Then came Heavey. Professor Heavey — my colleague, my friend, my perennial headache — shuffled forward with the air of a man entering not a border but a metaphysical threshold.
Officer: “Purpose of visit?”
Heavey: “Ah, purpose. An elusive term, is it not? For what is a visit, if not a perpetual exile from the homeland of Being, a sojourn into the abyss where self confronts Other?”
The officer blinked. I saw the secondary inspection room light up in his eyes. I intervened.
Me (translation): “Tourism.”
Officer: “Length of stay?”
Heavey: “Length? In Limerick, the Germans once whispered of dauer, duration. But time is no mere quantity! It is a lived horizon — a week can stretch into eternity when the self encounters its finitude—”
Me (translation): “Ten days.”
Officer: “Address while here?”
Heavey: “Address? Ah, but one cannot ‘address’ existence. The Cartesian cogito was but a false address to the postman of truth. Our dwelling is not in a hotel but in language, in—”
Me (translation): “Carlton Hotel, downtown, next to my room. Reservation confirmed. I’ll keep an eye on him, Sir.”
The officer exhaled. He glanced at Heavey, then at me, then back at Heavey — who by now was quoting Heidegger as if footnotes were a currency. The passport scanner beeped its green approval.
Officer: “Fine. You’re both cleared. Next!”
As we were leaving the booth, we heard the officer address the next in line:
Officer: “And my good woman, what existential urges have you brought in your carry-ons at this eternal junction?”
Heavey looked puzzled. “I think I had an effect on the chap,” he said. “Cognitive entanglement — Jung would be proud.”
I shrugged. “Phil graduates cannot find jobs in their field any longer, Heavey. Lucky you still teach.”
Heavey gave a thin smile. “No, my lost-in-space friend. It is a trifle family resemblance. I go through the motions, pretend to teach, with acts indistinguishable from knowledge transfer in all possible worlds — and my pupils? They only pretend to learn.”