A seemingly nondescript post card showed up at our doors a few days ago. From what I can tell it was sent from a mystical cabal of cycling enthusiasts set on distilling the true meaning of what it means to be “one who rides.”
The postcard reads,
When we speak of ourselves as protagonists, it is not whatever element of pro we find in ourselves that we venerate, but the agonist: “a combatant in the games: a contender for the prizes” (first use 1626, Cockeram, Agonist, a Champion). Agonious: full of agony. Agonic: without angle. Agon: a gathering or assembly for the public games. The agonists, separated from the pro by the shape used for crucifixion.
While a brief search of the word agonist reveals the current modern definition as An agonist is a chemical that binds to a receptor of a cell and triggers a response by that cell. Agonists often mimic the action of a naturally occurring substance. Whereas an agonist causes an action, an antagonist blocks the action of the agonist and an inverse agonist causes an action opposite to that of the agonist. At first glance it seems that this definition is at odds with the cryptic definition delivered to our doors, but I beg you prey take a closer look. I believe that those behind hind this mysterious postcard are part of a secret sect, one that has existed since ancient times, one who’s members exist among us, spreading their rote primal beliefs through society in the ancient manner of secret handshakes and knowing nods, hand signals, idiosyncratic gestures.
It is no small feat to create a cover definition for movement as culturally pervasive as the agonists. In the current definition we can see the cue words that tip other members its underlying truth. Its the idea of causing action, of eliciting a response, of fostering a reaction that has much to do with being an agonists as does the crucibles of auto-physio stations that an agonist must endure in search of the true meaning. Much like in the archaic definition, one who’s etymology is built in part on an the ancient idea of the hieroglyph. The lower case t in protagonist becomes much more than just the letter, standing for a symbol that has come to represent true self sacrifice, the t becomes a symbol at once separate and crucial, standing outside the word as something primal and intrinsic while functioning as an integral part to the word as a something that binds and delineates, the relationship between pro and agonist, both responding to and yet separated by the t.
It is with trepidation that I dare to share this information with you, the public, and it may be my own curiosity that leads to my demise. The idea that one sacrifices for naught, to suffer when all are blind, to struggle towards no end but ones own, seems, after all inquiry, the singular goal of the agonists. In a world in which the clamber for personal attention and adoration all but drowns out the notion of a pure form of self introspection. The agonist exist, much like the mountain ascetics of the east and the native spiritual adventurers of our own continent, in an endless state of self improvement through self reflection.
For more see, www.kapelmuurindependent.be
