Facebook (71) | Getting through

Bocklin, Medusa Shield, close-up

And now for another installment of "Face to Face."

 

I was asked years ago what I most wanted to do. I said, "Get through."

 

What I meant was, get through the wall of fear or indifference that seems to surround everything.

 

I have friends (real world type) who disdain this world (online) because nothing real can happen here.

 

I don't agree with that, and it sounds like sour grapes or more fear to me.

 

I think what they are saying may be closer to "I don't think I could succeed in that realm," or, "I've been disappointed in the past."

 

Which would be more interesting things to have said -- but they were not.

 

I have the same fundamental problem my dear daughter had. I live at a full boil, wanting things to happen. When it comes to interaction, I am nearly insatiable.

 

And it is very selfish. I specifically want things to happen for me. I get exhausted by other folks' neediness just like anybody.

 

I believe the real purpose of the appendix is to prevent people from appreciating their own neediness. Once it is extracted, like goes on -- but people know. They don't say anything. But they know.

 

I get envious. I visit someone's page and see that they have wonderful long exchanges with friends. And the friends are encouraging, and affectionate, and most of all, they are there. They have not headed for the hills.

 

And I wonder, how do they do that?

 

I think there is something about art and artists that people hate, in a very deep, raw way.

 

Right brain people do something to us that we don't like, or disagree with on a visceral level.

 

And you know what? I don't know what it is!

 

But it's a lovely joke by the Great One. He makes all these people this way -- longing to get through. And these are the very people who will never get through. By definition. There probably isn't even any "through" to get. It's like those caves that Wile E. Coyote would paint on the rocks.

 

In the movies, Road Runner would zoom into the cave, to safety. But you and I, we know better.

 

Sigh ... Slam!

 

It's like having fish in a tank and adding a teaspoon of formaldehyde to it every day. As spectator sports go -- nah, the Great One probably sees it as a scientific experiment.

 

As I get older I find myself turning to substitute visions. 

 

Knowing no one is going to interact in any meaningful way, one begins to live mischievously.

 

My 500 page collected works was mostly sincere ... but there was a part of me that, in the compiling, snorted and thought, "This'll show 'em!" 

 

I.e., I'll build a tower to God so that we can all take a 2x4 up and bash him in the eye, and I won't charge nuthin. 

 

Prometheus did less when he stole fire on our behalf.

 

There is the tale of the djinn. Confined in a lamp for 10,000 years, he vowed to reward anyone who rescued him.

 

But as time passed, he grew wroth, and vowed to kill whoever was his savior.

 

It's sorta like that. Someone has to pay. Cuz these feelings are not gonna go away on their own.

 

As I get older I understand mass murderers better. They are just artists with straight razors.

 

That's all for today. But join us the same time tomorrow for another installment of "Face to face."

 

Bocklin, Medusa Shield

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