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Friends of
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Living in Caves
--10/8/01
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Hello Kiddies-
I guess what I fear most is flying again. The thought
of boarding a plane, not a single passenger aboard
with their agenda outward for all to see. Not one
passenger seated as the plane zips along the tarmac
whose soul had been x-rayed upon check in at baggage
claim. Prior to these recent events, I used to be
afraid to fly, like John Madden afraid. I would
take buses, cars, opt for 30 hour drives, all to
avoid flying. This is just how I lived, in complete
avoidance of my irrational fear. It was never the
terrorists, it was the slim chance that the plane
would experience an anomaly in mechanical failure
and crash, killing me. The reason I struggled with
the anxiety, was because in my thoughts, I put myself
there. I put myself into a situation of complete
vulnerability. I was so unable to fly, I would get
prescription drugs from the doctor if I had to take
a flight, I would drug myself and then depart in
a state of petrification as this giant steel tube
hurdled through the air to it's destination. So
now you have some sort of an idea as to what air
travel represented to me before the attacks on the
world trade center towers. Now factor in that, the
complete unknown of a human being, willing to sacrifice
his own life to kill many. Factor in a human being
willing to stop the flow of blood to his brain,
so he can no longer think, reason, love or care.
This element now makes me literally tremble with
anxiety. On September 10th, one day prior to the
attacks, I received a call from my friend telling
me that the flight was booked, the tickets were
ours. He and another friend of mine, were about
to embark on what would be my first trans atlantic
flight. With deep fear, I agreed to join them in
mid October, on the exploration of some caves that
our human ancestors painted in over 25,000 years
ago. The next day I saw terrorists use airplanes
as missiles and direct them into the twin towers
in New York. I watched in horror as my worst fears,
compounded by 1,000,000,000,000 (to the third power)
came true. I watched as hundreds of people, aboard
commercial airliners witnessed their own death,
I could only imagine the fear in their hearts, as
I imagined my own, my feet firmly planted on the
ground. I couldn't confront my own fear then about
the trip. I was too consumed with the horror of
the events the countless innocent, who died, never
realizing life. I mourned them and not until today,
did I acknowledge my fear of taking this trip. I
could only guess that I would cancel, fearing I
would have a breakdown caused by insanity just thinking
about the trip. It was today that I was walking
to a local diner for my dinner, it was early afternoon,
you could feel the cool air of fall as it sent a
couple of the first fallen leaves under my feet.
I ate quietly alone, and watched the developments
in a baseball game that I truly had no interest
in. I thought about writing and comedy and my life's
direction, I thought about my pending divorce and
the I thought about the caves.
The caves represent to me that all of us die, but
each has the power to leave something behind, something
that could shape if not change the future. If you
are a Lumpy reader, you know I will leave nothing
behind except shit stains in my underwear. But it
is true that if you are alive, experiencing things,
that this is what is left behind when you die. It
belongs to history. But I also thought of the non-permanent
place we inhabit in our time line. Who are we? We
are mostly a cumulative nothing, we are a certain
place in history, it has nothing do with us, we
are a by-product of it. Our experiences are what
we extract , we take nothing with us. We leave it
all behind. Our money, our cars, our jewelry, our
blood, our brain. It returns to the earth to be
regenerated into something else. The only thing
we do have the capability of is to not misuse what
we do have. Which we do, but it is also what they
did. When they took airplanes and used them as bombs
to kill innocent people. It is the same thing as
using a piano wire to strangle and murder someone.
It is a misuse of the product. The piano wire was
fine just being a piano wire, someone had to misuse
it to kill. This does not mean I can't sit down
at a piano and play it, without fear and anxiety.
It only means that the misuse of the airplanes,
was just that a misuse. I am going on the plane,
I am taking the trip. If I don't make it, than I
don't. I guess I am comfortable with that. If I
do make it, the caves will fill my eyes and brain
with irreplaceable experience that I could never
get without having gone. I choose to experience.
I choose to live. If someone takes my life away
from me, I can't stop them. If I choose to live
in a cave and hide, than I am missing out on life
anyway. Stand tall America.
TCB LTC God Bless America -
Lumpy The Clown
READ MY OLD ARTICLES
in SPENT LOADS
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