Dear moon: prepare to be devoured. That is all.
It is late. I want to write this down because it struck me as somewhat profound.
Alternate titles: "House of Leaves, Wolf Psychology, and The Boogeyman" or "eat yo-self, fool!"
I have been reading 'House of Leaves'. Everybody warned me it would freak me out. I scoffed. Then i read it. Then i freaked out. I respectfully retract my scoff.
So, I just made it across Little courtyard at 3am WITHOUT pissing myself, running, screaming, or collapsing in gibbering, helpless terror. It was a bit of a close call.
The book does its best to incite childish fear of the dark/ the boogeyman/ just indefinite, general fear of something indescribable and inescapable jumpin' yo ass. The book is very good at its job. Props, book.
I am reading it in the little cubicle thing in Witherspoon. I am SO unbelievably grateful to be reading it in a tiny, extremely well lit, perfectly cubic room with only one entrance and NO shadows or nooks whatsoever. My shit is tottering on the brink of flippage, nonetheless. But this excellent protection breaks down once i have to piss, and walk down interminable, twisting, depopulated hallways to avoid soiling my tidy little abode. So i was walking down the hallways, FLIPPING A SHIT, actually breathing hard and flinching at shadows. And I dealt with this feeling by practising 'fear stalking' or, as i called it before i knew that term, 'EAT ME, BITCH!'. This is highly literal. I simply yell, mentally, something like 'come on, you bastards, try and eat me! I will bite you in the face! I will kick you in your incorporeal nuts. I will writhe and punch your gullet even as it swallows me whole. I will not cower or run away or scream'. I then very firmly resolve that, when i inevitably see some freaky, impossible, looming hulk lurch out from a dark hallway or appear in a mirror, I will charge it and punch it and not go down like no punk.
This resolution, and these ridiculous (yet ENTIRELY serious) threats, are strangely comforting. Somehow, it is ok to get eaten by an inchoate terror, as long as it manifests an eye into which I can spit. Hopeless defiance is the ultimate security blanket.
OH. I remember now the third element i wanted to include in the title. some sort of reference to Braveheart, which i watched today.
The Scottish get owned. It is their job. It is their nature. The english are the boogeyman. They are utterly unbeatable; sometimes balked, but never really defeated. They will inevitably pwn the scots again, as they have for untold centuries. Even to William Wallace, this is probably clear, or at least overwhelmingly probable. So he's left with the same dilemma I was left with, and the same one every child has to face when he's left in a dark room with a closet inhabited by everything that little children can never escape. And, 'sfar's I can see (catch that contraction? pretty sweet, huh?), there ain't but TWO options available to the 3 of us, to deal with our various, yet funcitonally equivalent, boogeymen. You either hide under the covers/ swear fealty/ piss yourself, or you pointlessly, hopelessly defy whateveritis. The kid goes and sits in the closet, William Wallace moons the cavalry, and i dare my own diseased imagination to incarnate and make good its multifarious threats.
And, in all three cases, this solves the problem! The kid and I get off scot free (ha!), and so does dear W^2, after a fashion. The english own him, and, as far as he knows, they own the scottish too, for the 4 millionth time in a row. BUT. Like he says. You're gonna get ate one way or another (this is an imperfect analogy. fuck you guys. it's 4am). Anyways, the only difference is HOW you get ate. Mice are nervous as shit. Always scared. Terrible lifestyle. Wolverines, on the other hand, are crazy motherfuckers. They are not anxious. They are pissed. And i somehow suspect that, even as they get ate, the wolverines are having a better time than the mice. It just feels....RIGHT.
I would extrapolate further, but it's late, so i'll bring the moon into it.
I have a theory about why wolves howl at the moon.
Animals find direct eye contact threatening. The moon is a big-ass eye. The wolves cannot defeat it in a staring contest. They also cannot attack it. It is always just out of reach, but always very obviously threatening them. For all they know, some frickin' gigantic sky-wolf could come down at any minute and eat their very faces. But for some reason, he's reeeeally taking his time about it. So the wolves have the same 2 choices: they can all snivel and slink around and affirm the moon's super-alpha wolf status. Or they can give a big canine 'fuck you!' to the big incorporeal pansy and continue acting like they own the place, waiting to get ate.
My theory is that every wolf makes the same decision. And that a wolf howl is a highly specialized, very explicit statement, something like "Moon. I dare you to come down here. I recognize that you will eat me. But I ain't no celestial body's bitch. I promise that once you are within reach, I will try my damnedest to devour you. Until then, punk-ass." Wolves are renowned for their concision (conciseness? wutevs. lololol!!!!!!11!!!!!). Anyhoo. yes. I dig the wolves. I dig william wallace. I dig house of leaves as well. And i dig my ability to walk around at 3am despite reading it.
Side note: I find that, as I am uttering my psychic threats (often, I actually think, very loudly, " I will eat you, motherfucker! I will eat your face!"), My posture drifts toward the 'instinctive male defensive stance' (chest inflated, elbows drifting outward, shoulders either slightly hunched forward or slightly pulled back, head erect and eyes staring, kinda grimacing and perhaps clenching or kneading my hands). Nostrils flare on occasion, too. It is kinda funny. It makes me irrationally feel more ready to wreck a fool, and hopefully it doesn't make me look too silly to any real people who pass me and my crowd of imaginary omega-creatures.
ok. back to reading, then to sleep. Perhaps one day i will write an inspirational book called 'eat the moon'.
Alternate titles: "House of Leaves, Wolf Psychology, and The Boogeyman" or "eat yo-self, fool!"
I have been reading 'House of Leaves'. Everybody warned me it would freak me out. I scoffed. Then i read it. Then i freaked out. I respectfully retract my scoff.
So, I just made it across Little courtyard at 3am WITHOUT pissing myself, running, screaming, or collapsing in gibbering, helpless terror. It was a bit of a close call.
The book does its best to incite childish fear of the dark/ the boogeyman/ just indefinite, general fear of something indescribable and inescapable jumpin' yo ass. The book is very good at its job. Props, book.
I am reading it in the little cubicle thing in Witherspoon. I am SO unbelievably grateful to be reading it in a tiny, extremely well lit, perfectly cubic room with only one entrance and NO shadows or nooks whatsoever. My shit is tottering on the brink of flippage, nonetheless. But this excellent protection breaks down once i have to piss, and walk down interminable, twisting, depopulated hallways to avoid soiling my tidy little abode. So i was walking down the hallways, FLIPPING A SHIT, actually breathing hard and flinching at shadows. And I dealt with this feeling by practising 'fear stalking' or, as i called it before i knew that term, 'EAT ME, BITCH!'. This is highly literal. I simply yell, mentally, something like 'come on, you bastards, try and eat me! I will bite you in the face! I will kick you in your incorporeal nuts. I will writhe and punch your gullet even as it swallows me whole. I will not cower or run away or scream'. I then very firmly resolve that, when i inevitably see some freaky, impossible, looming hulk lurch out from a dark hallway or appear in a mirror, I will charge it and punch it and not go down like no punk.
This resolution, and these ridiculous (yet ENTIRELY serious) threats, are strangely comforting. Somehow, it is ok to get eaten by an inchoate terror, as long as it manifests an eye into which I can spit. Hopeless defiance is the ultimate security blanket.
OH. I remember now the third element i wanted to include in the title. some sort of reference to Braveheart, which i watched today.
The Scottish get owned. It is their job. It is their nature. The english are the boogeyman. They are utterly unbeatable; sometimes balked, but never really defeated. They will inevitably pwn the scots again, as they have for untold centuries. Even to William Wallace, this is probably clear, or at least overwhelmingly probable. So he's left with the same dilemma I was left with, and the same one every child has to face when he's left in a dark room with a closet inhabited by everything that little children can never escape. And, 'sfar's I can see (catch that contraction? pretty sweet, huh?), there ain't but TWO options available to the 3 of us, to deal with our various, yet funcitonally equivalent, boogeymen. You either hide under the covers/ swear fealty/ piss yourself, or you pointlessly, hopelessly defy whateveritis. The kid goes and sits in the closet, William Wallace moons the cavalry, and i dare my own diseased imagination to incarnate and make good its multifarious threats.
And, in all three cases, this solves the problem! The kid and I get off scot free (ha!), and so does dear W^2, after a fashion. The english own him, and, as far as he knows, they own the scottish too, for the 4 millionth time in a row. BUT. Like he says. You're gonna get ate one way or another (this is an imperfect analogy. fuck you guys. it's 4am). Anyways, the only difference is HOW you get ate. Mice are nervous as shit. Always scared. Terrible lifestyle. Wolverines, on the other hand, are crazy motherfuckers. They are not anxious. They are pissed. And i somehow suspect that, even as they get ate, the wolverines are having a better time than the mice. It just feels....RIGHT.
I would extrapolate further, but it's late, so i'll bring the moon into it.
I have a theory about why wolves howl at the moon.
Animals find direct eye contact threatening. The moon is a big-ass eye. The wolves cannot defeat it in a staring contest. They also cannot attack it. It is always just out of reach, but always very obviously threatening them. For all they know, some frickin' gigantic sky-wolf could come down at any minute and eat their very faces. But for some reason, he's reeeeally taking his time about it. So the wolves have the same 2 choices: they can all snivel and slink around and affirm the moon's super-alpha wolf status. Or they can give a big canine 'fuck you!' to the big incorporeal pansy and continue acting like they own the place, waiting to get ate.
My theory is that every wolf makes the same decision. And that a wolf howl is a highly specialized, very explicit statement, something like "Moon. I dare you to come down here. I recognize that you will eat me. But I ain't no celestial body's bitch. I promise that once you are within reach, I will try my damnedest to devour you. Until then, punk-ass." Wolves are renowned for their concision (conciseness? wutevs. lololol!!!!!!11!!!!!). Anyhoo. yes. I dig the wolves. I dig william wallace. I dig house of leaves as well. And i dig my ability to walk around at 3am despite reading it.
Side note: I find that, as I am uttering my psychic threats (often, I actually think, very loudly, " I will eat you, motherfucker! I will eat your face!"), My posture drifts toward the 'instinctive male defensive stance' (chest inflated, elbows drifting outward, shoulders either slightly hunched forward or slightly pulled back, head erect and eyes staring, kinda grimacing and perhaps clenching or kneading my hands). Nostrils flare on occasion, too. It is kinda funny. It makes me irrationally feel more ready to wreck a fool, and hopefully it doesn't make me look too silly to any real people who pass me and my crowd of imaginary omega-creatures.
ok. back to reading, then to sleep. Perhaps one day i will write an inspirational book called 'eat the moon'.