Hi Welcome to another first ever pseudo-intellectual B.S.ing!
I was having a chat with my brother tonight and a critical
question popped up. How do you feel about the fact that the world is over in,
what is now... 5 days away?
I found myself immediately split, both analytically and
impulsively. I wasn't sure how I felt. Excited? Sad? Serene? Well sure,
"all of them," you might say. And to those of you who would have said
that, I'd say some of the following. People have a dangerous excitatory addiction
to the idea of apocalypse. It offers some a deadline for redemption or a point
of closure on existence. Some even would think of it as a super bitchin'
opportunity to see some rad shit.
Lets face it, if we are gonna form conjectures for an end-times
scaled apocalypse, we want to maintain certain standards in our imaginings. It
wouldn't be cool if after all this build up and momentum of millennia
after millennia of human change something deku-nuts us out of existence.
For example, if a solar flare strikes that is so intense and so sustained that
everything on the surface of the earth was scorched instantaneously, it
wouldn't be fun at all. Like maybe for a satellite to record, but for us? I
think people want their apocalypse to be rife with human intensity and strife.
When most imagine a zombie apocalypse they can't help but say, "Show me to
the nearest nail-gun and lets do this." There's a certain desirable flare
in a violent survival-fest where there is no identity or person-hood to the
victim.
I get it, "It would suck. We'd all die." There are
several holes in that argument that I won't even address but, if we are gonna
die, and its gonna suck... why not imagine it happening in a
badass way. Picture a mutated beetle infestation that eats everyone faster than
we can burn the buildings it infests. Pretty cool right? Now imagine every
super-volcano ashing out the earth, kinda cool but less cool. WHY? The only
correct answer worth discussing is that with the beetles we can fight back, we
have a chance. Lava and pyroclastic flows of brimstone melting us over the
course of 10 hours? Not as cool.
We want
whatever brings about our destruction to be outside of our control, yet
forgiving enough to allow us salvation, or offer us some semblance of closure
before dissipation. We imagine nuclear holocausts, meteors, and earthquakes but
even when we conjure thoughts of human weapons wiping us out we blame it on
some mad men whose minds are bent on destruction. By marginalizing the
responsibility of the destructive act we alleviate our obligation to feel
guilty at all.
This is so
much easier than imagining the possibility that our apocalypse may be more
drawn out, more innocuous, and directly our fault. It’s easier for us to
imagine a flash of nuclear warheads detonating at once than it is to entertain
a century of uncompromising poverty, starvation, intra-national violence,
plummeting appreciation for sciences and art, and sporadic elementary school
shootings. Why? Because if we allow those things to be our apocalypse then we
would have to face the indelible fact that that time is upon us now. For those
(few) who choose to endorse the ending of time as we know it, it doesn’t need
to be a horrifying cacophony of screams.
We have a
choice, as always.
We can
freak out and buy canned food and move to Minnesota or we can choose to see the
beautiful opportunity to allow such tragic times to underscore our enduring
magnanimity. If the world was actually opening its chasms to slurp us up, or
flaring its nostrils to scorch our skin, would you really want to spend the
last of your days holed up maintaining your interpersonal status quo? If you
sincerely had 3 days of life left, how would you act? What about 3 weeks left?
3 decades? Of course it matters which one, but not completely.
I suppose
it’s as though when we experience an earthquake we go throughout the home and
batten down all the bookshelves that we should
have secured in the first place. But, some outside force presents the fragility
of our situation on a silver platter before us and, bam! we change. Perhaps the
mere discussion of whether or not we’ll all be eaten by alien crocodiles in 3
days is good for us. It forces us to review our moral status and take our
life’s temperature.
Are we not
being honest with someone close to us? Are we afraid to try something we’ve
always dreamed of? Are we putting off helping somebody near us until “the right
time”? Or are we just waiting out our own pain until we get swept off our feet
to some emotional clearing beyond the woods of life’s confusion?
Maybe
instead of arguing over whether or not we are granting this “apocalypse” the
gravity and worth it deserves, we should ask ourselves if we are giving each
other the gravity and truthful recognition we all deserve. Perhaps if we all
took some time to write down those thoughts we’ve been waiting to get out, tell
that person we love them, or apologize to our once trusted friend then we would
find out that with or without the apocalypse, we’re better off realizing that
every instant could be our last. This moment could also be just a drop in the
bucket, or a drop in a new bucket, and if so, what do we want to fill that new
bucket with?
To quote
the man we all hate to love,
“Say what
you need to say. Say what you need to say. Say what you need to
saaaaaa-aaaa-aaaa-aaa-aaaay.” -John
Mayer
Go forth… and
continue going… and never stop.
