Outlet time!!!!
Okay, so there's a lot of stress going on in my life right now and I need to do something creative to get it off of my chest. But I'm not really a very creative person. So, what I'm thinking is that I'll just tell a story that happened to me this one time a couple of years ago and maybe that will help me with the "boundless impotent rage" I've been feeling all morning.
Actually, that's all a bunch of crap. I've really just been wanting an excuse to tell this story so I made one up.
About thirteen years ago, when I was seven, my family and I were driving back from the west coast where we had just bought a big ugly van and a camper to pull behind it. This was our great road-trip, coast-to-almost-coast in a month. Since we had so much free time, we did a lot of sightseeing.
One of the things we tried to do was find Wyoming. Now, I know you're all reading this like, "Why would he be looking for Wyoming? It doesn't even exist!" I know. At the time, I didn't really understand the physics of it, but since then I've had time to peruse Tesla's "On the Western Black Hole Thingy," and while I, too, struggle with his metaphore of the cat who is both alive and dead and eating a meatball, I think I get the idea now. Kinda anyway.
But, either way, it wasn't my idea. My parents are really big on parageography. About two summers later we tried to keep up with the Delowarian migration for a couple of weeks, but lost it when it was skirting the Canadian boarder.
Anyway, I'm getting off track. This story is about looking for Wyoming.
So, my dad had heard a rumor that if you started on the top of a mountain in Montana, you could make your way down a narrow dirt road that ran very close to the Wyomingian Event Horizon. I later found out that he learned of this road in an issue Popular Contradictions, that the road was actually on a farmer's private property, and that he didn't believe in the Wyoming phenomenon and hated/liked to murder everyone who did. I promptly thanked my father for risking my seven-year-old life.
Anyway, this is what went down. We stayed the night before at a seedy hotel about ten miles from this "road." I overheard my dad telling my mom that he had asked about the road at the front desk and the lady there told him how to find it, for ten bucks and a bottle of tequilla. The five of us--my parents, myself, my brother, and the hellspawn Quarn'Dingo (that's a whole other story you'll have to ask about sometime)--slept in this seedy little place for about four hours until we heard an alarm going off outside. My dad woke up and rushed outside and we all followed. One of the rooms on the far side of the hotel was on fire. There was a small hand-crank-type fire engine trying to put out the flame, but they wern't having much luck. The lady from the front desk, now wasted off her tequilla, gave us our money back and told us to just leave before any more of the police showed up. We obliged and set off for the road. We had a damn camper, so we just parked on the side of the road and slept in it.
This, however, was not a more peaceful sleep. There was obviously something wierd going on in the woods. My dad just told me it was bears migrating, but I'm pretty sure that bears don't do that. I'm pretty sure it was sassquatch mating season. Now, whenever I see one of those proud, majestic creatures on the bus going to work, I always think of that night by the woods, listening to the crooning sound of rediculous furry-type sex. It truly is a beautiful thing, I think. Maybe. Well, if you're into that sorta thing. (301-555-2896 *wink*)
The next morning we prepared to visit the brink of infinity. I had my camera.
We took this back road for almost forty miles, seeing nothing but brush and trees and fur-filled condoms until, finally, something started getting wierd.
To our right, about ten feet into the woods, we saw there was no light, no trees, just a black nothingness.
This was it.
We had found Wyoming.
To think back on it now, I can't really believe it. A couple of years ago my brother and I went back to find that same road, and maybe we did or maybe we didn't, but we could never again find the sucking soul-eating bleakness that is Wyoming.
I remeber getting out of the car and walking into the woods, holding my mom's hand. We walked almost to the edge, but didn't get too close for fear of getting sucked in a system of debilitatingly poor public education and country music--truly a fate worse than death.
I stuck out my hand, just a little, and almost touched the edge. I wanted to, really wanted to feel the smooth black line where reality breaks down and infinite chaos reigns. I wondered, was it hot? was it cold? If I touched it, would it feel like fulfilling a life-long dream and satisfying an urge to knowledge that only a very few before me had ever known? Or, in touching it, would that desire be destroyed. If I had touched it, would the majesty and beauty of something forever outside my graps become something tangible and, therefore, insignificant? If that was the case, could I really live with myself if I had let the beauty of something unknown die at the hands of a lust to know? I thought, "Do I touch it, and forever understand? Or do I not, and continue to love the beautiful unknown?"
It was at this point that it finally dawned on me that I was really fucking GENIOUS seven-year-old.
I let my hand down. I did not touch infinity.
We stood there, the five of us, staring into nothingness for almost an hour.
Then we got hungry and went to IHOP. I had an omlette with pancake dough ON THE INSIDE! IT WAS AMAZING! Man! What a fucking omlette!
The next day we left the Wyoming behind and continued home. We saw a lot of strange things on that trip, but perhaps that will all have to wait for another day. Like, when I have more shit to do and I can put IT off by telling more stories.
Actually, that's all a bunch of crap. I've really just been wanting an excuse to tell this story so I made one up.
About thirteen years ago, when I was seven, my family and I were driving back from the west coast where we had just bought a big ugly van and a camper to pull behind it. This was our great road-trip, coast-to-almost-coast in a month. Since we had so much free time, we did a lot of sightseeing.
One of the things we tried to do was find Wyoming. Now, I know you're all reading this like, "Why would he be looking for Wyoming? It doesn't even exist!" I know. At the time, I didn't really understand the physics of it, but since then I've had time to peruse Tesla's "On the Western Black Hole Thingy," and while I, too, struggle with his metaphore of the cat who is both alive and dead and eating a meatball, I think I get the idea now. Kinda anyway.
But, either way, it wasn't my idea. My parents are really big on parageography. About two summers later we tried to keep up with the Delowarian migration for a couple of weeks, but lost it when it was skirting the Canadian boarder.
Anyway, I'm getting off track. This story is about looking for Wyoming.
So, my dad had heard a rumor that if you started on the top of a mountain in Montana, you could make your way down a narrow dirt road that ran very close to the Wyomingian Event Horizon. I later found out that he learned of this road in an issue Popular Contradictions, that the road was actually on a farmer's private property, and that he didn't believe in the Wyoming phenomenon and hated/liked to murder everyone who did. I promptly thanked my father for risking my seven-year-old life.
Anyway, this is what went down. We stayed the night before at a seedy hotel about ten miles from this "road." I overheard my dad telling my mom that he had asked about the road at the front desk and the lady there told him how to find it, for ten bucks and a bottle of tequilla. The five of us--my parents, myself, my brother, and the hellspawn Quarn'Dingo (that's a whole other story you'll have to ask about sometime)--slept in this seedy little place for about four hours until we heard an alarm going off outside. My dad woke up and rushed outside and we all followed. One of the rooms on the far side of the hotel was on fire. There was a small hand-crank-type fire engine trying to put out the flame, but they wern't having much luck. The lady from the front desk, now wasted off her tequilla, gave us our money back and told us to just leave before any more of the police showed up. We obliged and set off for the road. We had a damn camper, so we just parked on the side of the road and slept in it.
This, however, was not a more peaceful sleep. There was obviously something wierd going on in the woods. My dad just told me it was bears migrating, but I'm pretty sure that bears don't do that. I'm pretty sure it was sassquatch mating season. Now, whenever I see one of those proud, majestic creatures on the bus going to work, I always think of that night by the woods, listening to the crooning sound of rediculous furry-type sex. It truly is a beautiful thing, I think. Maybe. Well, if you're into that sorta thing. (301-555-2896 *wink*)
The next morning we prepared to visit the brink of infinity. I had my camera.
We took this back road for almost forty miles, seeing nothing but brush and trees and fur-filled condoms until, finally, something started getting wierd.
To our right, about ten feet into the woods, we saw there was no light, no trees, just a black nothingness.
This was it.
We had found Wyoming.
To think back on it now, I can't really believe it. A couple of years ago my brother and I went back to find that same road, and maybe we did or maybe we didn't, but we could never again find the sucking soul-eating bleakness that is Wyoming.
I remeber getting out of the car and walking into the woods, holding my mom's hand. We walked almost to the edge, but didn't get too close for fear of getting sucked in a system of debilitatingly poor public education and country music--truly a fate worse than death.
I stuck out my hand, just a little, and almost touched the edge. I wanted to, really wanted to feel the smooth black line where reality breaks down and infinite chaos reigns. I wondered, was it hot? was it cold? If I touched it, would it feel like fulfilling a life-long dream and satisfying an urge to knowledge that only a very few before me had ever known? Or, in touching it, would that desire be destroyed. If I had touched it, would the majesty and beauty of something forever outside my graps become something tangible and, therefore, insignificant? If that was the case, could I really live with myself if I had let the beauty of something unknown die at the hands of a lust to know? I thought, "Do I touch it, and forever understand? Or do I not, and continue to love the beautiful unknown?"
It was at this point that it finally dawned on me that I was really fucking GENIOUS seven-year-old.
I let my hand down. I did not touch infinity.
We stood there, the five of us, staring into nothingness for almost an hour.
Then we got hungry and went to IHOP. I had an omlette with pancake dough ON THE INSIDE! IT WAS AMAZING! Man! What a fucking omlette!
The next day we left the Wyoming behind and continued home. We saw a lot of strange things on that trip, but perhaps that will all have to wait for another day. Like, when I have more shit to do and I can put IT off by telling more stories.
posted by LegStrong @ 11:49 AM
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