Episode #13

Jeremy:
This episode was called ‘false labor’. I’m interested in seeing how Braxton Hicks can become a metaphor . . .
The professor’s wife’s behaviour has become increasingly erratic. Several weeks ago she attempted suicide, stopped eating, lost interest in normal activities, increased her sleep, was consumed by feelings of guilt and had considerable psychomotor agitation. This week she seems to have feelings of gradiosity of position, decreased sleep, and has taken an interest in pleasure seeking activity. If you’re keeping track of your SIGECAPS and your GSTPAID you’ll know that her behaviour is enough to warrant lithium and an antipsychotic rather than subject herself to increased social stressors.
The professor’s relationship with his wife has hit a bit of a snag. He’s been working on a substitute version of his wife in order to create an artificial sentience: the only problem being that he recreated a copy too accurate. . . she hates him too. For a man who ‘lives for a family’ he’s remarkably proficient in destroying it – bonus marks for consecutive summative failure.
The professor states that ‘it’s the littlest rules that are hardest to break’. Is it those little rules that help us remind us who we are? Is it the relatively low risk:benefit ratio of these rules which help or is it a concrete part of one’s life one can claim to order? Apart from the iniquity to one’s ethic of choosing which parts are fit to maintain, what if the littlest rules that have a more formative effect? More than that, though, how does the professor put himself in a position of ‘chooser of rules’ if they are truly formative? If I make the rules which make myself is there room for God? A question which can fortunately be avoided if we put ourselves before all else. This brings one back to labour pains: creating ourselves (aside from an awkward gestation) is a false labour. Enter Mr. Hicks.