‘T-Shirt and Genes’ and the pursuit of happiness

This Week’s Winner: Katrina Tan graduated from Ateneo with a degree in Management Information Systems last year. She was a features staffer in The Guidon. Her interests include the arts, watching movies, the beach, music, writing and designing. She works as an editorial assistant for Seventeen Philippines.

Anyone who’s endured a broken relationship knows about the life-altering changes that inevitably ensue. Your phone suddenly requires much less attention, what was previously a "we" is now an "I", and you’re left with tons of time to think about the what’s-wrong-with and the why’s of your life.

This unfortunate yet typical scenario is the backbone of Richard Asplin’s quirky debut novel, T-Shirt and Genes. But with Charlie Ellis, a 22-year-old biology teacher hell-bent on theorizing his way through life, as the main character, the story unfolds to be not quite so typical. Charlie’s scientific musings are full of fascinating facts about relationships and happiness. Complete with Asplin’s light-hearted execution, madcap British humor, and words like "knobwit" and "bollocks," you’ll quickly find yourself at the mercy of this rousing page-turner.

Each chapter is introduced by a witty quote and is concluded with a letter written by Charlie to Mr. Tell Me How, a scientific children’s magazine, back when he was still young. These letters inquire about every little thing on the young Charlie’s mind; and are a stark reminder of the oh-so scientific way he looks at life, how he’s still a lost boy seeking structure in his life.

Chapter one begins with a quote from Malcolm Bradbury – "Genitals are a great distraction to scholarship." That’s right, the novel starts right off by revealing the cause of Charlie’s break-up with his fiancé and co-worker, Deborah: they get caught engaging in inappropriate behavior on school premises during parents’ night, by both the parents and the students.

As one would guess, both Charlie and Deb are subsequently fired from their teaching positions. And even worse, they are of no consolation to each other since Deb has conveniently managed to disappear from Charlie’s life since the incident.

Suddenly, Charlie finds himself unemployed and single. His two best friends from childhood try to alleviate his pain with the ol’ reliable advice and alcohol remedy. But with Adrian, a new dad, and Brad, who was never too blessed with the talent of consolation, Charlie is pretty much left on his own to put his life back in order. He doesn’t take the usual relationship rebound route, like any normal man would do. Instead, his poor, convoluted brain magnifies every incident to even more massive proportions as he wrestles with theory after theory before reaching a final conclusion at the end.

He begins with the Madonna-Whore dichotomy. Since back in the day, man has had two kinds of women: the future spouse, with which he can talk and bear children with; and the casual fling. Now natural selection has designed us to spread our seed, or else our species will disappear. On average, a child is composed of 50 percent of his mother’s genes and 50 percent his father’s. So when a man chooses a spouse with whom he will share his offspring, he needs to consider things other than who has the curviest ass or the longest legs. He needs to consider things like fidelity.

For a man, whose sole purpose is to survive and procreate, he doesn’t want to waste his valuable time and effort on children that aren’t his. So by all means, men, sow those seeds. But if you want a long-term, solid investment, complete with worthwhile dividends, then you’d be better off basing your choice of spouse on traits other than the physical.

With that in mind, Charlie continues his scientific reflections at the local zoo, a place where he and Deb used to go during class trips. Charlie’s favorite animal there is a silver-backed mountain gorilla called Jeremiah. But that day, Jerry seemed grumpy. Wendy, the zookeeper, explained that Jerry was pissed off because Diana, the female gorilla, was in heat. And though Jerry’s been sniffing about her for days, she’s not responding. Jerry even tries to bribe Diana with food for sex, to no avail. Wendy explains that the female is a flirt. She just needs to know she’s wanted, so she’ll lead the male on for a bit before running off…something that Charlie finds himself easily relating to.

Days, weeks, a month goes by, and Charlie has not heard a single word from Deb. But he has heard about her. Liz, Adrian’s pregnant wife and Deb’s good friend, tells Charlie that Deb and him are finished. And after a sketchy chat with Brad, Charlie discovers that Brad’s now seeing his ex-fiancé.

This shocks Charlie into morphing into a new man. He fixes his house and replaces his poster of Bruce Willis with someone more suitable – Charles Darwin. Science was Darwin’s life, and he applied it to everything. Even Darwin’s view towards romance was clinical and detached. In fact, one of his journals lists the pros and cons of marriage. The pros are: chit-chat and someone to care for the house; while the cons are: lost conversation with clever men, fatness, and idleness. Yup, this was Charlie’s role model.

So when Charlie learns that Darwin had actually planned to become a priest before he found his calling as a biologist at the ripe old age of 29, he decides to quit his teaching career and look for something that could get him leaping out of bed in the morning. "Happiness, the pursuit of happiness, that’s the prime human motivator. You find something that makes you happy, then you don’t mind getting up in the morning," Charlie tells Adrian.

Humans, despite their being the most intellectually advanced life forms on the planet, are still the least content. Dogs are happy. Fish are happy. Jeremiah’s happy. Thus, Charlie concludes that the smaller and simpler the brain, the happier the creature. And this is where our unhappiness lies. Humans have always snootily believed that their existence serves a higher purpose. But in actuality, our purpose is just as simple as the rest of them: to survive and reproduce. We are merely overdeveloped, and the rest – philosophy, art, music…is all just window dressing, all garnish.

Sometime later, Charlie bumps into Wendy and she asks about Deb. Wendy remarks that every time she saw them at the zoo, they looked like they were on their first date again. That she could practically see them cooing over their first baby.

This image of parenthood leads Charlie to his final theory: Monogamy. It would seem that males would find monogamy at odds with their goal to spread their seed. However, newborn babies are very fragile. So if the odds of an offspring’s survival are to increase, then the male needs to stay. Therefore, the recipe for sure-fire genetic success would be to find a mate, produce the goods, and stay around to make sure the infant grew up strong, sturdy, and true. In other words, he had to get back with Deborah. Plain and simple.

In the end, Charlie realizes that, sure, humans are complex creatures. But that’s the way it is, and we all need to deal with it. Nature isn’t interested in our happiness; it only cares for our numbers. We come up with happiness and friendship and love on our own. And once you accept that nature won’t lend a hand in your happiness, you find it on your own.