The story of Portabelli was related to me by the son of a dear friend of mine, Milo. The world truly overflows with mysteries such as these. Since hearing of his tale I have tried to further the investigation and discover what became of Portabelli myself but to no avail. His name has been erased from the record and no trace of him remains in any official register or academic listing. Perhaps the mandela effect is at play!
Portabelli’s Story
Mr Portabelli is a history teacher in a private boy's school. He has a PhD in history and an extremely nervous disposition.If you are inclined to animal analogies, animal familiars, Portabelli would be a small marsupial with trembling whiskers and large eyes. In Portabelli's case his nervous, oversensitive nature is beautifully counterbalanced by a profound gentleness. He wears his dandruff hair page boy style, has a refined Italian face, is of small stature and dresses in baggy corduroy trousers with cardigans of mismatched colours, browns and greens. His cologne is of course Odor De Mothball. While you may have met someone like Portabelli they are becoming increasingly hard to find. Shame that. But do you really know a Portabelli? I didn't.
The school is a select entry school for the best and brightest, an old boys school, Hogwarts like to look at. As in any social grouping all vacancies, all social spaces, are filled. Some of these promising young men have been forced to become jocks, bastards, they have been sacrificed to the higher organism of the school community to ensure that the population is balanced and each social category is occupied. Some of these boys smoke pot or snort amphetamines at lunchtime down the back oval, their unsuspecting parents still believing that their futures are assured. Other boys, the few who remained nerds and intellectuals amongst nerds and intellectuals saw in Portabelli a little of themselves. But mostly they saw a vulnerability in Portasbelli and were cruel to him.
It is difficult to overstate the duress that these students applied to poor Portabelli. Verbal abuse, intimidation, fear and violence. Bad boys from caring families can sometimes be the cruelest as their amorality has never been softened by hardship. To see Portabelli's soul visibly recoil was so difficult for the rest of the staff that they turned away, they could not take it, they abandoned him. Some were so adversely affected, their conscience’s so assaulted that they laughed, a defensive cowardly laugh. I won't list the specific humiliations that were inflicted upon Portabelli, that would distract us from what is important here, but please be assured that the pressure that was brought to bear upon him was more than most could endure.
Portabelli had a beautiful Italian wife, a pure person who loved his gentleness, and to see them laugh and converse together who could speak of what soul affinities they were sharing. Something went wrong with her, her cognitive faculties began to fail, the prognosis was bad, she deteriorated quickly passing away during second semester of Portabelli's third year. Shortly before his wife transitioned Portabelli had pleaded to his year 10 history class, imploring their humanity, spare me, forgive me, love me. He had drawn a chalk stick-man on the blackboard surrounded by swirling arrows, bold arrows in different colours describing the ominous forces that were crushing him, arrows with illegible labels. This is me he had said, the stick-man is me! Dear reader, let me be direct and state it again, allow me to be forthright. Portabelli was under enormous pressure. The travails of his life, his sufferings, my God, dear Job. Do they not say that in the concentration camps it was the brutes who fell first, who perished first? Wasn't it the meek and the weak who went on, who endured and resisted?
The incident in question occurred about a month after the death of Portabelli's wife, in late spring. As Milo relates it a few of the boys began to notice black sedans stationed outside the school gates with black suited men sitting inside them, watching. A surveillance operation was being conducted, it was obvious. These secret service types can be pretty amateur. Perhaps they were advertising their presence intentionally, who knows. In any case amongst the observant there was much discussion and the presence of these secret police was closely monitored. After two weeks of this, on a Friday, during a history lesson on the rise of fascism, while Portabelli was reading softly, gently from the text, “Franco, Hitler, Mussolini”, three of these black suited agents arrived at the classroom door and waited there silently. Upon noticing them Portabelli bowed his head, inhaled deeply, stood up and proceeded to walk deliberately over to them whereupon two of these criminals clasped Portabelli firmly about his biceps and lead him forcefully away. As Portabelli had walked over he surreptitiously produced a small piece of paper from his cardigan pocket and discreetly let the paper fall. While everyone was aghast and murmurs and chatter began to fill the classroom one of Milo's friends retrieved the note. Unraveling this crumpled piece of paper revealed a cypher, a cryptographic key, written in Portabelli's unmistakably delicate, intricate hand. The following Monday class was taken by a new featureless teacher whose methods of discipline stood in stark contrast to Portabelli. As the weeks passed rumours circulated amongst the boys, innuendo. The boys began to put two and two together. Portabelli was a resistor, a martyr. They began to admire him, respect him, and he became sorely missed. The school administration however was like a wall, they closed ranks and refused to mention Portabelli. No reference was made either to Portabelli's departure or his existence, Kafkaesque. Milo inquired with the authoritarian vice principal, a Mr Duke, and was simply advised to mind his own business, there is no issue, who are you talking about, you're late for class.
The mystery has a little epilogue for those who paid attention. An unhinged homeless man appeared one day wandering the corridors and breezeways of the bluestone buildings of the school ostensibly begging for money. After a chase he was tackled to the ground by the PE teacher and the aforesaid Mr Duke and was gruffly escorted off the grounds. But here's the thing. This homeless man was seen by one of the boys rummaging purposefully in Portabelli’s old office. The cryptographic key that Portabelli had discarded in the moment of his arrest was of course already long lost.
Reflection
While specific answers to the mystery of Portabelli may be irretrievable a few conclusions can nonetheless be drawn. Portabelli had fallen foul of some powerful agency. He had done something to warrant his arrest, his disappearance, his evanescence. He must have been engaged in secret activities that were against the interests of the state, against the deep state's interests. Portabelli must therefore have been an activist, a subversive, and given his deep understanding of history this should come as no surprise. I am filled with admiration for this sensitive man who despite being under so much personal pressure still found a perspective above his own tribulations and attempted to act for the greater good. Choosing to teach history to adolescent boys already evinces high moral purpose.
I know of a similar tale of resistance enacted by an academic. While I should probably dedicate an entry solely to this individual I will briefly mention his act of resistance here too. This man was a scientist, a physicist, whose research held promise for the development of new abominable weapons. His university welcomed the attention of weapons manufacturers and substantial grants and funding began to flow into the institution. His closest friends were shocked that he would assist these efforts so wholeheartedly. In fact while seemingly enthusiastic he obfuscated and hid his research and managed to delay the development of these new weapons by more than a decade. When his subterfuge was finally discovered he lost his position at the university and later he too disappeared.
Dear reader, we stand in a moment of history in which enormous pressure is being brought to bear upon us. The situation is rapidly deteriorating. We are manipulated into social categories and then set against each other. Do you feel it? Can you feel it too? Neoliberal, neoconservative, oligarchic, soul crushing pressure. We are being herded towards oblivion or worse. Chelsea Manning, Julian Assange. We too need to find the courage to survey things from above our own personal standpoints, from above the melee of our individual lives. When will you act? Or will we all soon be rounded up into FEMA camps whilst waving their blank and meaningless placards?
Bank of America mural - screenshot taken from The Outer Dark
A Second Thought
While I have enormous respect for the resistance movement, lately I have been influenced by new voices in the alternative media. Voices like James Corbett, James Evan Pilato, Derrick Broze. The politics that we have is irredeemable. If we stop feeding it our energies will it start to unravel, will it begin to decompose? Perhaps it will produce a nutrient rich compost as it starts to fail, good soil for the fragile shoots of the new social orderings that are emerging even as we speak. Shouldn't we rather be directing our efforts to tending these promising sprouts and buds that are germinating all around us? The human spirit is an indomitable thing.
A short list that I will try to expand on!
