January 14, 2003 - A Day at the Lake
An ill-fated day at the lake very nearly cut the skein of my life to the all too tender age of eight short years. Looking back over the gulf of time between now and then, I find that I remember that day as clearly as if it had happened but moments ago, or perhaps as clearly as one typically remembers the moments preceding an unavoidable trauma. Those long moments where the guard rail or embankment or semi-trailer or some other such object looms before you as you become of acutely aware of the fact that something awful is about to happen. When time stretches and vision sharpens and every nerve ending is set alight, prepared to engrave the next few moments of panic and helpless terror into your psyche for the rest of your life, regardless of whether that lifetime be measurable in millennia or microseconds. It seemed that, by my way of thinking, those moments should be filled with panic falling just barely on the saner side of chaos with the mind racing to find ways of escape the inescapable rather than the almost eerie calm that the possibility of swift and certain death, but that never seems to be the case. There is, of course, always the frenzy of thought and action and rage that accompanies the war with the reaper but, after those moments are passed, and all ways that one can see of slipping past the scope of his scythe have been closed, there is a certain quietude, a relief that follows and, accepting the outstretched hand of death, we are, at last, free.
Free of what? In posing that question, my thoughts come back around to the day at the lake. In my memory, the sun is never quite so hot any other time of the year as it is in the height of July, and if nothing else, it is the heat that lengthens the summer days. The heat makes you lazy too tired to move, too tired to think, too tired, period. I think that it was my mother and her friend getting tired of lazing around that brought us to the shores of Mouse Island on that long summer day. I remember the gentle rumbling of my mothers station wagon, loaded to the gills with kids and water toys as it rambled down the old gravel road, pulling past the old church into the parking lot of the only public beach on the tiny island. Adults, kids, toys and rafts tumbled out of the car and ambled towards the waters edge, our shadows lengthening across the grassy field abutting the sandy shore.
There was nothing unusual about that day that would have given any indication that a near-tragedy was looming and, really, after all was said and done, to call it a near tragedy fosters the notion that the day was more dramatic than it actually was. My mother had a knack for downplaying anything that went wrong, mostly, I think because she despised worrying, and looking back on that day, there was probably a great deal for her to worry about. Treating the whole event as If nothing happened was her way of coping with coming as close as she did to losing her only daughter to a watery grave, and in the end it was probably for the best. Panic is often contagious, and had she taken that route I probably would have been traumatized enough to avoid any large bodies of water for the rest of my natural life.
If there was anything remarkable enough to call out of the ordinary, it was the fact that I was oddly quiet that day. I wasn't splashing boisterously through the water with the other kids who were endlessly tickled by the exchange of forcible dunkings taking place. I was perfectly content to sit on the raft that we had toted along with us and watch the day go by. No swimming, no dunking, no Marco Polo, no snorkeling. Just...sitting.
There is something about the odd man (or girl) out contented to be exactly that that is unnerving to kids herded together like wildebeests on the savannah. It is as of the worst aspects of the collective mentality manifest in defense against this alien concept of solitude, and the troops rally to correct the aberrant behavior. I, of course was oblivious to the hint of conspiracy that lingered in the air and went about the merry task of contemplating the sound of the lake water lapping gently against the side of the raft, enjoying the middle ground between sea and sky. I was equally oblivious to the heads of three other children bobbing below the waterline one by one and circling the raft like a school of sharks catching the scent of blood beneath the waves.
I could not say for certain who it was that upended the raft that I had camped out on, nor can I remember what was shouted at me as I slid off the yellow monstrosity and into the cool green water that held it afloat. I can't even say for sure what thought I held in my head in the moments prior to its sudden disruption. What I do remember with perfect clarity is the shock of suddenly finding myself five feet or so below the surface of the lake and, thanks to a theretofore unknown undertow, descending rapidly. Mind you, the water was probably less than nine feet deep, but at eight years old and four feet tall, nine feet of water, a violent undertow and a tangle of rope-thick kelp stalks is enough to cause a problem. The very strange thing is that, looking back on that moment, I note the absence of a sense of panic. Indeed, there was a sort of disturbing fascination with the burning sensation in my lungs as I struggled to free myself of the grasp of the lake. I remember a sense of euphoria coming over me at the consideration of the fact that I may very well be about to die. I remember the almost overwhelming desire to fight the instinct to hold my breath and simply take it all in. I wanted to become a part of seaweed, of the water and the tides, to embrace what I tried to resist. To give myself over. To give in.
As I am here relating this tale some 22 years later, it goes without saying that that didn't happen. Some length of time after I had slipped below the surface (probably no longer than a few minutes, as any longer than that and someone else would more than likely telling this tale) I had been fished out of the lake like a trout on a hook , dragged to shore and pounded on the back until the water that had seeped in through my nasal passages had been evacuated from my body in a violent exhalation. The areas where my brother and the other kids responsible for the upending were pounded I will not divulge, except to say that, for them, it was an uncomfortable ride home on some very bumpy roads.
These events had not been brought to mind in many years before now. What has ejected them back to the surface I cannot say with any conviction, other than, perhaps to consider now what I lacked the faculties to consider when these events occurred, which is not the moment itself, but the thoughts that went through my mind when I had become certain that I was going to die. There was no panic. No fear, no sense of wanting what was happening to not happen there was nothing save the euphoria of the realization that I was going to become part of something larger and much greater than myself. I was going to become one with the lake, with the water and everything in it. It was a feeling that I not only welcomed but embraced.
It is true that I at the time probably had no idea what was going on in my mind, but there are many things that happen in our lives as children that we lack a full appreciation for or understanding of until we have matured in our Worldview and the ability to express that Worldview. As such, I cannot ignore that looking back to then from now, that is what I see. I know that people are often given to recalling unpleasant events as something not quite as unpleasant as it really was, but as I find no unpleasantness in these recollections, that logic would seem not to apply. Rather, I think that I have finally come to understand that what I went through then is not unlike that moment of perfect clarity preceding an unavoidable trauma. Possibly a version of it more adapted to the mind of a child, but in no other way dissimilar.
And what does this all mean? If what I have said is true and accurate, what impact, if any, does this have on the way that I see things? In truth, not much. It does, however, bring to mind questions about the nature of not only death, but of life. What if that moment of realization is fostered by the acceptance that there is absolutely nothing that you can do to prevent or control the outcome of what looms before you, and that in that moment one embraces not death, but the possibility of becoming part of something greater than we think, erroneously I believe, our human existence allows for? What if all of our strivings in life towards unity through conformity is just a reflection of this desire to be something more than we believe ourselves to be or capable of being? What if life is a glimmer of death, and what if death is a glimmer of something greater than both? What if every moment of your life is lived for the moment in which we embrace the vast and unlimited existence that abounds both around and within us, and what are we depriving ourselves of if that realization comes only in the moment of death? Unity? Immortality?
I cannot help but wonder if on that day the skein of my life was cut at the all to tender age of eight years of age. If that which tied me to what we know as life lies buried in the sands of Mouse Island, leaving the part of me that remained to discover what it is to truly be counted among the living. To learn that there is no death without rebirth, and it need not be the moment when the body can no longer go on in which we discover this. What if what I experience now, and have experienced every day since that long day in July, is indeed Life after Death?
If that is the case, then perhaps I still have yet to fully realize what took place on that day at the lake. October 8 - Hair Today, Shorn Tomorrow
I have adopted as part of my morning routine browsing my email and favorite websites in the pre-dawn darkness of my bedroom. There is a certain odd serenity to the glow of a computer monitor in what is otherwise absolute darkness. It is like a lighted window to the world, evoking memories of my old Dungeons and Dragon role-playing adventures where all portals, all gateways to different "wheres" and "whens" seemed to hover ghost-like in the gloom of night. Every day should start with as much melodrama.
One of the sites that I check in on routinely is the site belonging to one Rick Emerson - Radio Talk Show Host and Knower of All Things Trivial and Obscure. It must be said that I have distaste for radio in general that probably exceeds rational bounds. My distaste for talk radio exceeds that tenfold. With the possible exception of having my tongue forcibly unstuck from a frozen doorknob, there is nothing that I like less than hearing people with an over-inflated sense of their own self importance pontificate about any and everything as if possessed of some greater knowing than those mere lowly mortals. I only started listening to Rick, truth be told, because my friend Adam told me that I reminded him a great deal of Rick in my stream of consciousness mini-rants, my wry humor, my profound sense of irony and my propensity for collecting knowledge that is of no discernable use, and insisted that I give him a listen.
And so I did.
Over the last few months I have come to find that Rick is, on some level, someone I can seemingly relate to. (I thought I was the only person whohad a disturbing liking for "Weird Al" Yankovic and have read "The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and embarrassing amount of times. Not so, according to Rick.) I hear a lot of myself in the things that he says. Granted, there is much that he says that I disagree with, and there are some moments when he is an inveterate asshole, but, then again, I am fully conscious of that I am often given to such moments, and as such I can't say that Rick being an asshole is a bad thing. Sometimes the only thing that separates a normal person from their asshole self is the willingness to say aloud what most people were already thinking. Oddly enough, this is probably also what separates those people with careers in talk radio and the rest of us.
And so this morning, browsing the web log portion of rickemerson.com, I came to learn that Rick has bid farewell to the "last the last vestiges of <his> metal youth" and cut his hair. Granted, it's not an event that passes muster as "monumental" in the grand scheme upon which I often ponder, but it is momentous nonetheless, as he apparently has seen neither hide nor hair of his short-shorn self in thirteen years. At the risk of projecting my own views on the subject onto his reflections, the timbre of his literary voice as it recalls days gone by and the path down which his long hair has led him, gives one the idea that perhaps adopting of the long-haired look all those years ago was not simply a fashion statement nor was it motivated out the reflexive and pointless rebellion common to one's adolescent years - it seemed a declaration of independence of sorts. It was a decision to be who he felt he was and not what others would have him be. There was probably a thinly-veiled nose-thumbing at authority woven into the fabric of that choice to let those "shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen" tresses flow, but that is almost always a given to any act or action that cries "I will not conform".
Although I have made a concerted effort to shed my attachments to the surly bonds of image, having known too many who have suffered too much for the sake of the preservation appearance over substance and truth, I will confess that I was a little saddened at the news of his hair's passing. A silly thing to shed a tear over to be sure, for I know full well that who he is, who anyone is has little to do with how they appear. But still, humans as a species have a profound attachment to our symbols, and in some ways laying them aside is not entirely dissimilar to laying an old friend to rest. (There are many who contend that it was the loss of the Twin Towers that changed the tone of New York City, and not the loss of the lives of those who worked in them. Truth be told, though, it is more than likely both.)
So what does long hair symbolize to me? Well, despite the allusions to danger that often accompany the average long-haired male, to me it is more indicative of the embracing of one's individuality. The Roman Ideal - the square-shouldered, clean-shaven, close-cropped, conformed and faceless citizen - still holds sway in the world. Long hair is for the barbarian malcontent bent on the disruption of the "social order" perceived to be inherent to conformity, or at least for those who the reject the universally accepted norm. The Long Hair Legions march to the beat of their own drum, out of step from the rest of the rank-and-file who secretly envy them for their independence.
Maybe the real heart of this twinge of sorrow for the lost locks is simply this: As I said, there are a great many qualities about Herr Emerson that I strongly relate to. A long hair Rick is someone who stands out to me, someone whom I can look at and immediately identify as skirting the fringes of the herd, the wolf rather than the sheep. Just like matching uniforms tell one solider that he is the same side as another, so to does a non-uniform say this pea is in a pod all his own. The short hair Ricks of the world, though, the individuals in disguise are a lot harder to spot. Even though I know that they are out there, for those of us taking life at our own pace, not being able to pick them out of the crowd gives the world the appearance, at least on the surface, of being a lonelier place to live.
Thankfully, I know that looks aren't everything and that one should never, ever judge a book by its cover.
"So, this is it...starting tomorrow, I enter the world a relatively clean-cut, somewhat-young man-----one who may look, to the untrained eye, like a million other Y-chromosomes, but who will always be, in a small, secret corner of his heart, waving a flag for the loud, proud slice of his life from once upon a time."
Rick, it seems, knows that, too.
Setpember 4, 2002 - The Art of Magic
I am a fan of the art of Magic. I grew up on the TV magic of David Copperfield and Doug Henning. I still watch the Greatest Magicians shows when they come on and I am completely fascinated with the life of Harry Houdini.
In keeping with this tradition, I consider myself a great admirer of the Street-Magician-Turned-International-Man-of-Mystery David Blaine. He is probably among the most spectacular illusionist of our day, and may very well be on his way to being as well-known and as mysterious as the great Harry himself. I have to say, though, that my fascination with David Blaine is less with his "art" and more with what seems to be his philosophy or at the very least, his approach to "magic". It this philosophy/approach that brings to his particular expression of the art of magic, in my way of thinking, a certain "reality".
Allow me to explain.
You see, magic tricks in and of themselves hold little interest for me beyond an appreciation of them as an art, in much the same way that one appreciates a painting or a sculpture or a good poem. You approach them having a basic idea of what you are going to see, whether it is an arrangement of paint on a canvas or clay on a pedestal or a rabbit out of a hat. More so with magic tricks, as the very designation magic "trick" tells you that you are some how going to be fooled. We know that something that we know and believe to be impossible is going to appear to happen right before our eyes. And, while each arrangement, each trick is entertaining, and while it appeals to our sense of wonder on almost a universal level, a trick is still a trick.
So, why the fascination with the philosophy of "magic", and how it relates to David Blaine's "magic" in particular? Well, according to his official internet forum, one of David's Favorite quotes is from the German author Goethe, who states "The unnatural - this too is natural." When asked for my thoughts on this, I stated that to be able to determine what is unnatural, one must first know what is natural. The foundation of the one is built on the other, and, therefore, by the act of defining one, those parameters and limitations are incorporated into the definition of the other.
Now, the unnatural being the natural is a variation on a number of themes prevalent in Eastern thought, the overall concept being symbolized by the Yin Yang. Light in darkness, darkness in light, good v. evil, right v. wrongonce any concept is created or defined, then the extreme opposite of that concept also springs into existence. If you declare what something "IS", then it is unavoidable to also declare what it "IS NOT".
In life, people are conditioned to see things not as existing separate and whole and self-containedthey are conditioned to see what one thing is in relation to another, that something is what it is because it is NOT something else. So indoctrinated are people into this practice that they are by and large unaware that they engaging in it. People will generally see something in terms of being "natural" or "unnatural" and ne'er the twain shall meet, without seeing the two as being parts of a larger whole. Applying this concept to the terms "possible and impossible", or the "real and unreal". The impossible then becomes possible and the unreal, real.
I believe that this concept is at the heart of David's Art.
In the interview that he gave prior to his "Vertigo" Stunt, he said, in response to the question "How do you feel when you levitate", "I am no different from anyone else, I just see things differently." Now, imagine if you held the idea - if you saw that the unreal was real, the impossible, possible, or, more to the point, the real is the illusionary and as a result, you knew that it is just as easy to manifest the appearance of the impossible, of the unnatural as it is to manifest the appearance of the possible, the natural - What is it that you couldn't do? When David was quoted as saying that magic is about connecting people and connecting to "the moment", I believe that the ability to see that the belief that all things are equal, the possible and the impossible, the real and the unreal, is a means by which that connection can be made. Magic is a means of presenting that idea - it is, as is all art, a vehicle of expression. It is the manipulation or arrangement of perception to present the idea that all things are possible nor impossible, real nor unreal, natural nor unnatural. And what is this "moment" that Herr Blaine is trying to connect people to? Perhaps it is the moment when the line that separates what "Is" from what "Is not" disappears: that golden moment where all things simply "Are".
And that is what everything comes down to, when you think about it. If you apply the concept of the unnatural being natural, the unreal being real, then the answer to the question "Is David's Magic Real?" is a resounding yes - or it is at the very least as real as anything else. (Or as illusionary as everything else.) David never asks "Can I show a you a trick?" He asks people "Can I show you something?" and allows them to decide for themselves that what he presents is a "magic trick", to decide that something impossible just occurred right before their eyes. It is that choice to believe that what they see before them was impossible that creates the sense of amazement with the trick. Should they choose to believe that what manifests itself is a possibility that had never before been considered or realized - that is what creates the sense of amazement with LIFE. That idea, that choice is what distinguishes that "something" from being a simple "trick". I happen to think that David presents IDEAS using a more rarefied form of the art of illusion/reality (read: perception) manipulation than most people do. Everyone, in some way or another and whether we realize it or not manipulates the illusion of reality on a daily basis; some of us quite simply have more of a flair for the dramatic than others.
If you hold in your mind that the natural and the unnatural are interchangeable to the degree of being one in the same, then the same is true for what is real and what is an illusion.
August 31, 2002 - Time
Recently, someone asked me for my thoughts artistically or otherwise on the subject of time. This is what I wrote:
I do not believe in "Time" as it is traditionally perceived. I believe that there is an absolute "moment" that all things in all forms exist simultaneously. Where everything begins, exists and ends all at once. What we call past, present and future are different expressions of One Idea, One Existence, One Absolute Moment. The lives that we have lived, are living and will live are nothing more than looking at the same multifaceted existence from different angles and directions. Different perceptions. I think that there is a reason why "History repeats itself", or why there are numerous cultures that believe in some form of reincarnation and transcendence into a different state of existence. Whether you are experiencing the One Idea as a single mother raising three kids in the inner city, or as a famous movie star, or a quiet Zen Buddhist, you are all experiencing the same existence from different points of view. Its as if we are all different facets of the same diamond, and each being, each lifetime, each existence is simply allowing the light to pass through different facets. The appearance of the diamond may APPEAR to change, but in reality its still the same.
Now, why do we perceive time as a stream of events connected as a chronologically ordered series? The best way that I can think of to explain it is by referencing one of my favorite books as a child: "A Wrinkle in Time" by Madeline L'Engle, which was my first real introduction to the ideal that actual time may not be what we perceive it to be. At one point in the story the main characters, who were time travelers of a sort, accidentally "tessered" (a bit like teleporting, except that you move through time and space simultaneously) to a planet where the gravitational forces were so oppressive that everything on the planet only existed in two dimensions. The author described, (as best as one could conceivably imagine) what it was like for some one who existed in three dimensions to suddenly, albeit briefly, be forced to live in two dimensions...how the lungs couldn't expand to breathe, how the heart didn't have enough room to beat, how everything could move, but only in terms of length and width. The third dimension depth was impossible to achieve.
Now, If we assume that there is an absolute moment, and that all things exist simultaneously, then let us assume that although the "Fourth Dimension" IS Time, it is time as I have described here and NOT what is traditionally defined as time. Now, assuming that we have some unconscious awareness of Time, but our brains cannot perceive this absolute moment in its entirety, then what is effectively happening is that this Time - this four dimensional experience is compressed into three-dimensional perception. We are viewing this moment a sliver at a time, like a movie reel through a projector. We are given the impression that things are moving in a progression that we determine as forward, that we grow and age and that events flow in a stream, but that is all an illusion. The same way that time expands and contracts when you are watching a good movie, so it does in life. That is why some moments seem to last forever and why days and weeks can seem to blur together because, on some level, our perception alters in such a way where we are seeing much larger or much smaller segments of this absolute moment. Take as an example the universal sensation of moments of time and events seeming to slow impossibly in the moments preceding an accident or traumatic event, how the minds seems to take in every detail, every sensation. What may happen in a matter of seconds seems to have lasted for hours. I believe that this is because the chemical reactions that take place in your body catalyzed by trauma effect perception in such a way that allows one to see a much smaller section of this absolute moment in perfect clarity.
Now, can we perceive this absolute moment at will? I believe so. Once we start to divorce ourselves of the idea of linear, chronologically sequential time, once we start to imagine that events in our "future" can effect our "past" and our "present"...once we start to imagine that events can be "out of order"...akin to deja vu...experiencing a moment before it actually occurs in "reality", then we can train our brains to start perceiving more of the absolute moment. I have lots and lots of reasons to believe that this, in fact, works.
If there is an absolute moment, and if how we experience this absolute moment is simply a matter of altering perception, then there really is no such thing as "physical distance". Any type of traveling that a person does is really, when you think about it, a process by which we change our perspective. When you think about the reasons why people travel...needing a break from their surroundings, wanting to see something that they have never seen before, have an experience that they have never had before...those are all experiences that a person could have without really going anywhere. But, often people need to change their geography to convince themselves that they have, or to give themselves permission to, change their perception. On a much larger scale, this idea can also be applied to the concept of death and reincarnation. All death is a physical means of altering your perception. In the physical world that we are a part of, often times changing our perception is centered around some physical circumstance. How often have you heard people (often on talk shows) say that this makeover/tit job/accident where I lost a limb/blindness changed my whole outlook on life? In a way, is not death, transcendence into another state of being and/or reincarnation the ultimate makeover? What all of this breaks down to is the idea that the two basic foundations of physical science "Time and Space" are really one in the same. Its not time and space, its "Time IS Space" and both are a means that humans by and large employ as tools in the process of altering perception, their own or someone else's.
What if everything that we do in life, all of our creations to mark time: calendars, sundials, watches, etc. are all things that on some level keep us grounded in the concept of linear, chronologically sequential time? What if our dependency on cycles and routines and what not are in response to some primal fear or defense response generated by some deeply rooted knowledge of this absolute moment? What if we, on some level, constantly remind ourselves that there is a time and a place and an order and a sequence to everything because we fear what the world would be if there werent? Perhaps it is our misunderstanding of the idea of lack of order, or chaos that is the source of our fear. Perhaps that it's we don't want to think of the time and the place for everything being right here, right now.
August 2, 2002 - Intensely Vanilla
I wrote this piece as a part two to my response to the question of how I feel about pleasure as pain. This was posed to the populace of an online writing community that specializes in dark and/or erotic poems and stories. In relative comparison to most of the other members, my tastes for the erotic leans more towards the tame side of the barometer. Or, as my friend put it, Vanilla. In response to that comment, I penned the following:
For the course of my entire life I have grown quite comfortable with my role as the one on the outside. I enjoy being the quiet observer, the lurker below, the sole delegate for the lunatic fringe. I like the vantage point of outside the fray. It is where I call home.
It is not so odd, then, that even in a community of those who are outside the box in their own rights, that I should find myself once again circling the edge.
In this community of poets and writers of revelers in and celebrants of the Erotic side of their natures, I find that the tastes of the community at large teetering far more to the openly explicit than my own. Although I am fascinated by the exploits, the explorations, and the devil-may-care delving into the darker, or as it is said, less vanilla side of sex and erotica, I, myself find that they are by and large outside of my personal preferences. Being more cerebral, almost perhaps to a fault, many of the merits of more intense physical pursuits are foreign to me. Still, I am an eager student for information regarding these practices, greedily devouring any tidbit of your teachings. I am enraptured by the rich tableau that is created in these stories and poems are steeped in the musky aroma of leather and sex. One can feel the restraints tightening and biting into the flesh, one can hear the air resonate with the sharp cracks of the paddle or whip and the cries of pained release. It is intensity, endurance and sensation blended to create nothing short of the highest of the physical arts and disciplines. It is highly equivocal to the pain rituals practiced by many cultures designed to achieve an altered state - to step outside of the physical. It is The Art of Euphoria.
But, what about the quieter side of these disciplines? Is there something more likened to the focused precision of a Martial Arts Master than to the "Sweet Science" of this less focused, more "brutal" Sensualist Boxing? What about the mental and emotional destination that the vehicles of pain and sensation are driven to? Can the mental and emotional euphoria that one arrives at through the physical path be achieved in other ways?
I believe that the answer is yes. Indeed, this is the realm that I call home. I believe that my own personal sense of Erotica is perhaps more Tantaric in nature, working from the inside out. From the mental and the emotional to the physical. The same erogenous zones of the body that are alighed by Sensationalism are set afire in my mind. An elaborate fantasy, rich in its darkness, hinting none-to-subtly at domination and force of will played out in the construct of my mind produces the same euphoria in me as the cinching bonds of the manacle brings to many of you. The teasing of the mind with secrets and dark tales is as powerful of a foreplay as skillful tongues and fingers teasing the sex. The explosive release of the mind triggers a release of the body equally as powerful. Bring down the mental and emotional barriers and walls, and my willing submission is all but guaranteed.
Is it this entrenchment in mental and emotional sensation rather than physical sensation what garners me the label of "vanilla", or is it possible that my preferences have an intensity in their own right? Perhaps my experiences are more analogous to a mainline hit of an intravenous drug rather than a "tapping of the vein". Perhaps the physical route to euphoria is what dilutes the intensity rather than enhancing it, and perhaps that is with good reason. As I said in a previous post, people are by and large addicted to intensity of a sensation rather than a sensation itself. Perhaps my awareness of this addiction stems from a more intimate knowledge than I previously considered. Maybe in bypassing this perhaps necessary barrier of the physical, I have removed the filters that prevent the very addiction that I may well suffer from.
How intensely "vanilla"...
July 9, 2002 - On Pleasure and Pain
Today someone posed the question to me of what I think of pain as pleasure. My pat and slightly sarcastic answer to the question is: Pain Hurts. I have often had a good chuckle at the phrase "Pain lets you know that you are alive." For my own part, I have always thought that pain lets you know that you have just accidentally slammed a body part in the door.
But, in truth, I say those things because I like being silly.
I think that the association of pleasure with pain is a deeply psychological one. I know a great, great many people who revel in pain of any kind and they cause themselves a great deal of it just because to them, it feels good. The question is: Why?
I offer the following for consideration: Through time immemorial, humankind has been indoctrinated, generally via religion, to believe that to be happy is bad. It is something to be guilty and shameful for and shamed by, especially when there are so many others who suffer. We are told that the path to "god" is to suffer on Earth. To deprive ourselves of pleasure. In short, pain is good.
However, why SHOULD we feel bad about feeling good? The fact that the next man chooses, yes, CHOOSES to suffer should be of no consideration or consequence to us. His choices are his own business and should not impact our own. However, in a world where we are also indoctrinated to believe that we cannot survive without the acceptance and approval of others, this kind of "detachment" is almost impossible. It is our belief in the need for this approval that dictates our penchant for pain.
How can we be called on to live like this? How can we game playing, fun having creatures abide this existence? The answer: We are Human. We are the most adaptable known living species, next to perhaps the virus, and we are experts at finding a way to satisfy our needs. We need to be happy, we need pleasure, and we need to avoid the guilt associated with it...so we change the rules of the game. We take the suffering that we are told we must endure and we turn it into a source of immense pleasure. The ultimate spoilsport weapon. If suffering makes you happy, then are you truly suffering?
Pain is a sublime art. But, sadly, by my way of thinking, it is pop culture art. Pain is the Madonna of the realm of human stimulation: Once being possessed of a sense of novelty, it has become over marketed, overblown, overexposed. Pain is as hackneyed as the surgical exploits of Michael Jackson - Once a point of interest, now a model of absurdity. Many who pursue pain do so to ridiculous extremes. Pain, once teacher, becomes the epitome of the lazy student. Once the disseminator of knowledge, now grown into a fattened leach, thriving for its own sake.
The real challenge lies in the pursuit of true pleasure, free of the constraints (and restraints) of pain. If you doubt this, think of how many people you know that are truly happy without pain? Think of how many people you know that truly like life without pain...physical, mental, emotional? How many people do you know that do not mute their happiness in the face of stories or instances of the misfortune of others? I would say with a near-certainty that the list will be very short.
Everything is and should be art. Art for its own sake. Even if that art is the Art of Pain. Not pain for pleasure, not pleasure for pain. Pain or pleasure should be enjoyed in their purity and not diluted by one or the other. Commit to pleasure, commit to pain, but commit.
Now, this is not to say that every thing that anyone does that is painful is in pursuit of pleasure, nor is it bad to seek pain. But, I will say that MANY choices that people make are motivated by the pursuit of pleasure, whether they know it, realize it, acknowledge it or not.
The problem with pain is the same with pleasure, is the same with any intense sensation: it is easy to become addicted to. They believe that the pain is no longer enough, that the pleasure is no longer enough.. that the high doesn't last as long and the amounts of stimulus required increases. The problem with that is that people believe that they become addicted to the stimulus when it is in fact, the intensity. Intensity is the addiction...not the pleasure, not the pain. This lack of realization is all too often, and sadly, the path to self-destruction. It is intensity that blurs the line between pleasure and pain.
Then again...how thin is that line in the first place?
Full circle once again...
June 17, 2002 - The Point
I have been doing a lot of thinking recently and today. Thinking about the things that I have written on this site...the things that I have thought and felt and experienced recently and I have wondered: "What is all of this for"? Why have I devoted hours to writing the things that I have written and thinking about the things that I have been thinking about and posting them here for all or none to see? What has been the point? What, if any, meaning is to be found in this collection of mad scribblings? In a nutshell: Why?
Truth be told, when I set about doing this all of these months ago, I didnt know why I felt the need to. I mean, I have kept a journal of sorts sporadically throughout my life, and I have had lots of profound insights that have never seen the light of day. So, really, why is not a simple question to answer because it is not a question that is simply asked. The why is not just what I wrote, but why the pieces to the puzzle have been arranged in the particular manner that I have arranged them. Why did I post some things and not others? What in the name of the One have I been doing?
I think I have finally come up with the answer. But, before I tell you what it is, there is a bit of an explanation required.
I have a brother who is a year and a half older than me and he and I are nothing alike. We have always gotten along better than most brothers and sisters dobut we have just always been different. One of the biggest problems that came with that is that, after my having skipped a grade, I was only a year behind him in school. So, every year at the start of school I would hear from all the teachers that he and I shared, all the kids in school who knew him, the whole world "Oh, you're Russell's sister."
Russell's Sister. Never "Jennifer", never "Russell'[s your brother", always, invariably and without fail Russell's Sister. I always despised that. For as long as I could remember, even before school I was always Russell's Sister.
Now, I have to say that my brother is a smart guy...but he never really applied himself in school, which I could totally understand, because school was tremendously boring for me. But, I had always been a better student than he wasgot better grades, was well liked by my teachers...everyone always told me how bright I was. Looking back on that now, I think that the reason that I tried so hard in school was that I wanted to find something that brought me out of his shadow. I always did better than him. The other side of that, though, was that that was all I ever did. Better than him. Not always or necessarily my bestjust better than him. Truth be told, though, that was the only encouragement that I really had. My parents always expected more of me than they did of my brother. They always got that...but it never seemed good enough. It always seemed like they wanted more and, at the time, I really felt that I was doing the best that I could. Maybe at the time, it was. Everyone's comparisons of me to him limited me, made me limit myself in a way, to being only better than him and not being my absolute best. I finally understand why they said that I was never living up to my potential, but I dont think that they ever understood why. I remember feeling always as if I was doing my best, and that to them my best was never, ever going to be enough.
I have to say that I am not blaming him. He wasnt the source of my problem. My problem was that I didnt know HOW to NOT be in his, in anyone's shadow because that was all that I had ever known. At least consciously. Unconsciously, I have always done things to make me stand out from the people around me. Nothing dynamic or overly dramatic...just the kind of person that I was was different from most of the people that I knew. Its not that I wanted to be or saw myself as any better than anyone else. Just different. Unique. That was all I wanted. In short, I wanted to be my own person. Not a person of such and such type or ability as compared to someone else, just me. No comparison, no competition, just me.
Now, although it may seem that I wanted the world to recognize my uniqueness, that is not the case. I genuinely believe that the recognition that I was seeking was my own. I wanted to learn how to see my individuality in a world where, to everyone else, I was only who I was because I wasnt someone else. I believe that the life I have made for myself has been one big story probleman experimental construct on learning how to see, be and appreciate who I am as an individual.
Through all of this I have come to realize that I am and have always been my own person. Not only that, but been the person that I have always wanted to be. I have not recreated or reinvented myselfI have just stopped trying to. I have not played the role of the person that I always wanted to be. I have become.
So, the answer to the earlier question that I posed is this: What I have been doing is writing a manual, a chronicle, if you will, of my journey into realizing that I was trying to hard too become what I always was. It is my solution to the riddle of life. My declaration of independence.
Welcome to me.
June 6, 2002 - Chaos (?)
People have often been under the impression that I am a chaotic or random person. They say that my thoughts don't seem to follow any logical or discernible pattern, and that I seem to leap between seemingly unrelated subjects in much the same way that a frog hops from lily pad to lily pad.
Just to set the record straight...most people are completely wrong. I have tried to explain to them that my mind does work in a ordered fashionits just thoughts come to me so quickly at times that the leaps and bounds that I seem to take actually follow a progression, just a rapid one. In other words, even though by all appearances I seem to leap from point "A" to point "Q", I do actually touch on all of the letters in between. In short, my mode of thinking is much more akin to the frantic wing beats of the hummingbird rather than to the graceful, languid flight of the albatross.
Now, these same people who how level these accusations at me often do so because they become confused during the process of trying to connect one of my thoughts to the other, and finally arriving at the conclusion that it simply cannot be done. Although they attribute their confusion to me, the truth is that the blame lies with them because they are generally assuming that the connections that they seek do not exist simply because they can neither see nor are privy to them. In their attempts to bring order to the apparent chaos, they, in actuality, bring chaos to the order.
In a recent conversation with a friend, it occurred to me that this is not a process that is exclusive to me. Most people, in fact, tend to operate under one or two premises, both of which are somewhat exemplified in their reactions to me. The first premise being that certain events and occurrences are completely random and unconnected. People of this belief wave the banners of "coincidence" and "happenstance" over the event, individual or situation as if that non-explanation explains it all. Or, indeed, their frustration at their inability to connect the dots is mollified by the catchphrase "It is/was the will of God/The Gods", surrendering to the belief that they have absolutely no control over their existence because the control that they do have is not readily apparent. The second, and most common modus operandi is adopting the belief that the events that surround them have no connections. These people react to life by trying force their ideas of what they believe the connections should be rather than trying to see them for what they are. The process usually results in disarray of the existing connections, if not fostering the their total break down, bringing about the exact brand of random chaos that they were trying to avoid at the outset. In other words, they overcomplicate matters.
I am not a "religious" person by any stretch of the imaginationbut I do have a strong belief in that we, and the Universe knows what it is doing. I have faith, or, probably more accurately, I imagine that there are connections between myself and the events and people in my life even though those connections may elude my current perception. Oddly enough, in adopting this belief, these connections have become easier to see and to follow. I embrace the elements of chaos that abound, and in doing so have become keenly aware of just how ordered everything really is. Its almost as if I planned it that way.
So why does faith/belief/imagination come into this process at allespecially if the belief seems to have been proven, to me, to be true? Simply put, imagination is the key to expanding our perception beyond its existing boundaries. Without that imagination, without that expansion of perception Order will always appear to be chaos and the existing connections will always be almost impossible to see. The more you imagine, the more connections you will see. Be mindful that everything is connectedimagine that the connections are as apparent as the nose on your face, and you will understand the nature of reality in a way that escapes most people.
Of course, as always... I could be wrong.
April 4, 2002 - The Desert of the Real
Some time ago I wrote a peice about Perception. The gist of it was that perception is subective. Perception is also the basis for our reality, so in effect reality is subjective. You control perception, you control your reality. I went further in this idea to say that by encompassing others in your reality that you can effectively control theirs as well. I shall have to post that peice here sometime to give a fuller understanding of this concept. I have been told that it is not unlike the founding principles of a pseudo-metaphysical society that already exists...but I arrived at it through my own observations.
Now, along with this goes the realization that there is, along with our own individual worlds, a common reality that we all share. That common reality is based in the physical..it is the cities, countries, planets etc. we choose to live in. This is the world in which we by and large interact with each other. It is (intended to be ) neutral groud..the place where we all live by the rules that we set to foster a sense of common ground. In short, there is indivdual reality, based on individual perception, and there is communal reality, based on a consensus, usually (and ideally) of the majority. (Keep in mind that there are also certain factors inherit to a physical communal reality that dictate some of the rules...gravity, laws of physics, etc. being chiefest among them.) Think of it in terms of "The Matrix".
In speaking to someone today about a situation where her view of reality and another's confilcted (this someone happening to be her boss) I told her that one of the greatest problems of the world is that there are many people who spend so much time in their own world that they begin to mistake it for the common reality that we all share. More over, in being so totally committed to the idea of "That is the way the world is" while failing to realize "That is the way their world is", these type of people often drag others into their reality in an effort to make them see the "world" as they see it. This is the source of most conflicts between people, nations, etc. One person/group/entity expecting another person/group/entity to live as they think they should.
Recently I have had a situation where a conflict has arisen from myself and one of my greatest friends. In an effort to attend to some need that they had, I had inadvertantly allowed myself to be dragged into THEIR reality. How did this happen? Well, to be honest, it was simply from tying to be an attentive friend. I left my own reality aside trying to help them manage theirs and it in effect overtook me. I have for some time continually felt drained whenever I have spoken to them, but as speaking to them often allowed me to gain profound insight, I simply attributed it to the energy requirements of enlightend understanding. I did not, at the time, realize that I was investing my enrgy not only into my insights but into their reality.
As to the why of this...I was simply trying to help. There were several times that I pointed out the intensity of this relationship to this person, but I don't that they or I truly understood what was being said. It is only now, having been exhausted to the breaking point that I fully understand what happened.
Now, I am at a crisis point. This friend and I agreed to take a break from each other for a while in order to recuperate...but the more I reflect on this, the more I realize how exhausting this was. I am finding it difficult to motivate myself to continue the friendship, but at the same time it seems so silly to waste it. I know now that, above all else, that I am worn and that I need to get my mind in a place where I can renew and think clearly. Right now all I feel is the absence of emotion for them, and that is distressing.
The good that has come of this is that I have a much clearer understanding of communal reality and individual reality. Why is this important? Well, as long as we can make a clear distinction between the two, we can recognize when we are getting sucked into the reality of others, or when others are becoming sucked into our own. There are some people who genuinely enjoy being absorbed..enfolded in the reality of others. There is nothing at all wrong with this, but one has to keep in mind that to choose this path is to willingly accept that you have no right to complain when things become beyond your control. We all, in the end, get what we deserve and this instance is no exception.
I have to confess that there is another dimension of importance to this idea of individual v. communal reality, and that is if you find enough people who are desperate for another to enfold them in their reality then, in altering their perception, you can alter what they contribute to the communal reality. Both conciously and unconciously they will act in such a way that will bring their portion of communal reality in line with your vision of it. In other words slowly, and by inches, one can, in theory alter, read control, the communal reality in part or in totality. An awesome concept, I know...but having seen this in action on a small scale proving ground, I know it can be done. Those who might be tempeted by such and endeavor, however, be warned that it is not without it's consequences and that you might end up with alot more than you bargained for. Also keep in mind that the threefold law "That which you do will be visited back on you threefold", albeit a quaint little pagan witticism to some, is quite true. Never forget that.
February 10, 2002 - Old Loves and other Oddities
I have often wondered why we reflect back on the happiest times in our lives. Is it because at the time of the reflection we are no longer happy in our lives, or perhaps that we are measuring our current happiness against happiness that we have known before? If it is the latter, well, then it is an excellent exercise in learning just how much we have changed over time. But, if it's the former...well, do we look back because we want to know how our happiness went awry? Like everything I often think about, I suppose that it depends on the individual and the answer is probably one that changes from person to person. The only thing that I can really speak of with any authority is that I know why I look back to the happiest times in my life: to learn what it is that makes me truly happy. The difficulty comes from looking back and seeing things not as they were as a whole, but the parts that we remember clearly. And sometimes it takes events of the present to fill in the holes that we never knew were there. In our defense, the holes are not always due to seeing the past with rose-colored glasses, nor is it fading memory. No, sometimes it is simply that there are things that happened that we never really understood, and will without the benefit of seeing parallels of the past in the present.
Ok, so what am I babbling about?
One of the happiest times in my life was my second semester of my Freshman year in college. That is when I met my best friend at that time, Sara. I couldnt tell you when we met...it was through our affiliation with the SCA...and I don't even remember how it was that we became friends. Looking back, it really feels like we had always been friends. Something that would probably seem strange to many people, but par for the course for me. When I say I "made a new friend" what I really mean is that I reacquainted myself with someone who has been absent from this lifetime until the moment of meeting again. It is not getting to know a person at that point..it is more like picking up where we last left off. To quote Richard Bach "...Meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends." There is this incredible joy associated with it, at least for me. This enormous affection; this strange sort of familiarity and love. It can be...overwhelming because the logical "I just met this person" collides with that "By the gods I have missed you! I haven't seen you in forever!" and it tends to create a short-circuit of sorts. (As an aside, divorcing yourself from the misconception of linear time helps.)
Anyway, Sara and I hung out a lot. Through her I got to know her fiancee-soon-to-be-husband, Mike. Mike was terrific and it was obvious to me that Sara and he belonged together, even if many other people believed otherwise. Now, I wont deny that Mike was attractive, because he was...and talented, charismatic...all of those wonderful things. I could see that he was the kind of man that any woman would want, and not a one of them would ever see why his relationship with Sara was a perfect one. But I did.
Now, the truly odd thing was that I hit it off with Mike as instantly as I hit it off with Sara. It was very...strange. For that entire semester and beyond, when I wasn't hanging out with Mike or Sara I was hanging out with both of them. It was as if I was somehow part of that relationship. There was intimacy, but not sexual in nature. Sara knew more about me, and I about her than her friend and roommate of several years, and it was not uncommon for Mike and I to go for long drives and long walks hand in hand. It was nothing...inappropriate...I just loved being in their company. I was never unwanted, never the third wheel. I was the second person that Mike danced with when they got married (Sara being the first), and a week later Sara insisted that he take me to my residence halls Spring Semi-Formal. I never told them about it, or asked him toI wasnt even planning on attending. It was all her idea. She took me shopping for my dress.
I can't tell you what about that relationship was so satisfying to me. Maybe it was something that I needed at that time in my life. I mean, I was away from home and everyone I had ever known for the first time in my life, and I felt profoundly alone. I wasnt really interested in sex at that time (I was only 18), but I craved psychological and emotional intimacy. In one fell swoop I had two best friends and I was a part of something. It was like everything I needed at the time all rolled up into one. It was everything I wanted.
I reflect on this now because I have met up with a new "old friend." She reminds me very much of all of the things that I loved about Sara and more, and she has a relationship that I would give just about anything to be in. Not that I would ever, ever want to "take her place" in her current relationship because I understand that who SHE is and who HE is are best complimented by the other. And to be honest, I love the vibe that I get from her when she talks about "her man". Neither of them would be the same without the other, so I am very, very glad that they have each other. I am glad to know them, such as I do, and to know that they have found each other. But, I do admit that there is a part of me that misses what I once was a part of when I talk to her. It's like the relationship between Mike and Sara was an entity in and of itself...a separate being that I was in love with, and being around my new friend (friends) reminds me of that lost love.
So what does this say about me? Beats the hell out of me, honestly. Maybe nothing. Or maybe it is a clue to help me along this chosen path, a key to my destiny. Or, maybe its a lesson that love sometimes transcends people and the physical. Maybe the energy that two people in love can create becomes something separate and apart from the people themselves. Doesn't that turn just about everything that weve ever been taught on its ear?
I will have to think on it.
January 17, 2002 - How You Remind Me
My cubical at work is littered with various items to make it feel less like a workspace and more like a think space...a refuge and not a prison. Along with the usual photos of loved ones and work-related props like memos, phone lists, certificates of achievement, etc. there are quite a few items that are representative of my personality...odd bits like quotes, postcards, pictures, posters, poems, etc., to such a degree that I have wondered if people wonder if I have as much work in my play space as I have play in my workspace.
Also in my cube is a portion of my music collection. My taste in music ranges literally from Mozart to Metallica to Marylin Manson and everything in between. I do not listen to "rap" or "country" per se, but there are some songs in those genres that I do like listening to. (Lately my thing has been Jim Morrison and the Doors. It has actually been bordering on the same sort of obsessive interest in them that I had in High School...and Jim Morrison had been dead since the year after I was born! Nevertheless, in my most philosophical times I have often heard the voice of Jim in the back of my mind. His lyrics, his poetry drifting in and out of parts of my conciousness...bliss.
But, truly, I digress.)
I took a good look around my cube today and I wondered: why THESE things...these trappings? What parts of my mind were trying to speak to me through what I surrounded myself with? Were they reminders? Trophies, or simply there for my own amusement?
As I examined each item, reflected on their meaning to me, I began to think about them in a broader sense. Not just them...but all of the things with a place in my life...the books that I read, the music I listen to, the movies I watch, the art and artists that speak to me, the clothes I wear, the quotes I recite, my favorite cartoons, all of it. What did they mean? Why did I cling to the works of certain authors like gospel and dismiss other works by them as banal?
Then it occurred to me to look at it as an outsider may. If someone who was not me looked at all of these things, what would they see? Then I realized the answer: They would see pieces of me. They are the things that I have learned and the things that I want to remember. Parts of the puzzle. Put them together in the correct sequence and there I am staring back at them through a jigsawed smile.
But its more than that.
These things are answers to the questions that I have held in my mind my entire life...even the parts of it that I had not yet remembered living at that time. I have always sought the world that exists beyond the one that we see and touch and feel and interact in. I have always felt that I am more a part of that hidden world than this one. I am grounded where there is no ground. Even though it took me years to understand this journey that I was on, even though my conscious mind was rooted in the sequence of time, the part of me that I could not yet reach knew better. This path that I am on has been a lifelong one, whether I realized it or not.
The pieces of me that I surrounded myself with are the tools that I would and do still need for this journey. The answers have been there even before the understanding. That is what has been coming now. I have always known the things that I have spoken of here. All I speak of now is my understanding of it. Moments in time colliding and coalescing into wisdom.
We send ourselves messages, reminders to ourselves al the time. We simply have a difficulty in deciphering the code. What we have to remember is that we are the one that wrote the code.
January 6, 2002 - The Light at the End (?) of the Tunnel
"The Light at the End of the Tunnel." Consider that phrase for just a moment. The. Light. At. The. End. OF. The. Tunnel. Those words, that phrase has been a part of my life for so long that I truthfully cannot remember a time that I did not know it. I have heard it from friends, relatives, in movies, stories and in song. No matter when or where I heard it, or who from, the why was always the same: It has come to signify a pleasant ending to a long or arduous event or situation.
Recently, I found myself uttering these exact same words to someone, and for the first time that these words escaped my lips, I actually stopped for a moment and gave thought to exactly what I was saying. Now, I will spare you the details of the circumstances under which I made this comment, but it followed hard upon another phrase that has become my mantra lately, which is "Nothing is what seems." I have discovered that once you come to the point that sayings such as this are elevated in mantra status, it is usually because you have ample instances in which it has proven true. In any event, as I spoke those two phrases in that exact sequence, I discovered just how deep that truth goes...
"The light at the end of the tunnel" assumes something that we have come to believe over time to be truth, and that is that the light, in fact, sits at the end of the tunnel. It is generally held that at the point that the light is seen that the end is in sight. We wend our way through the journey, arrive at the light and stand in awe of it.
Well, then what? We just..stand..there?
The truth is that the only way to know if the light is indeed at the end of the tunnel is to go through it and see what is on the other side. What if the light is not at the end of the tunnel? What if in walking through you discover that light and the end of the tunnel have nothing at all to do with one another? What if the tunnel goes on beyond sight? What if there is another light further down the way? What then.
Mortals have this misconception, or, more accurately, a misperception that the events and trials of our life come to an end. That we hit a stage, complete a task, do as we feel we must in accordance to the situation and proceed directly from that task to another, seeing no connection to the end of one and the beginning of another. I believe that there is very little that could be further from the truth. All beginnings, all endings and every moment in between are connected, perhaps in a way that goes beyond "normal" or "common" perception, but they are. It is our perception that determines where things begin and end...if we choose to believe that the light is the end of it all, the resolution, the denouement, then so will it be. However, should you choose to question, to wonder, to believe that there is more on the other side, and if we live our lives and base our actions according to that philosophy, there will always be more tunnel.
So is this to say that you should never be satisfied, never settle for what life gives you? Should you risk the $500.00 dollars for what is behind door number two? That depends entirely on your outlook, as everything I say usually does. Again, I make no claims to knowing anything about anyone else's life other than my own, so I can only speak from my perspective, but for me, the answer is Yes. I mean, there are some instances where this philosophy may not apply, or at least it may not be wise to apply it, but if you chance nothing you gain nothing. Obviously that leaves open the possibility of losing. But, if you focus on the risk itself as opposed to the outcome of the risk, then you never truly lose. Most people see life as a game; there is a goal, a desired outcome and rules for obtaining that outcome. It becomes a win or lose situation. However, if you alter your point of view..see life as a dance..., just dancing, moving for the sake of the music or for none, there is no winning or losing, only the dance.
Cliches are cliches for a reason. The have stood the test of time and have over centuries proven themselves true. You can never go back, nor can you stand still. Life is forward motion and stagnation is this kiss of death. Perhaps that is why people who have what they call "near-death experiences" see that light. Perhaps that is why they believe themselves to be near death...because to them, that light is the end.
Of course, what would you call it if you thought it was only the beginning?
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