The Crow: The day after

Sunday, May 22, 2011

The Rupture

So, what do you do when the highly-touted, much-vaunted, eagerly anticipated End of the World Extravaganza skips this planet on its tour of the Universe, and you are left behind to endure more of the same old life you were hoping to escape? How do you face family, friends, and neighbors who probably are laughing their butts off because your Rapture plans ruptured? How can you have faith in anything else, ever again?

Probably the same way life goes on after you learn there is no Santa Claus, no Easter Bunny, no Tooth Fairy and no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Oh, sure, it will be hard for a few hours, or days, but you get over it. One hopes you will learn something valuable about yourself as a result of The Rupture. One also hopes you didn’t do something really stupid, like tell your boss what an effing moron you think he or she is, just before quitting your job with a holier-than-thou flourish on Friday afternoon.

Look at it like this: believing in the ramblings of an End-Times-Don-Quixote is like willingly stepping onto a huge patch of ice when wearing slick-soled shoes; knowing your risk of falling on your face is pretty high, yet on you go. Sure enough, you fall; some of you harder than others, depending upon how you’ve acted in the moments leading up to your Chaplinesque nose-dive. To be sure, there will be those who will laugh at your mishap. Ignore them.

Instead, look around at all the hands extended toward you, offering to help you get on your feet again. Pay attention to those who caution you to beware of the other icy patches up ahead. They also might have slipped, just as you did yesterday. Listen to those who offer advice about finding other, saner ways of getting through the tough times. Get yourself one of those posters that exhort us to “Keep calm and carry on.”

Above all, go easy on yourself. We all make mistakes. Yours wasn’t so bad – unless you did quit your job, and burned all your other bridges behind you. Might be a little tough for a while, in that case, but you’ll pull through.

This, too, shall pass.

Believe me.

Meaningful Quotes

"We are displaced by time."

-Marian Marshall Suplee Griest, late (first) mother-in-law, spoken to me in January 1994, in a dream after her death.

"We've got to live, no matter how many skies have fallen." - D. H. Lawrence (via Whiskey River, 8-22-2014)

"There is something scary about letting ourselves
go. It means that we will screw up, that we will relinquish the possibility of perfection. It means that we will say things we didn't mean to say and express feelings we can't explain. It means that we will be onstage and not have complete control, that we won't know what we're going to play until we begin,
until the bow is drawn across the strings.

While this spontaneous method might be frightening, it's also an extremely valuable source of creativity. The lesson about letting go is that we contain our own creativity. We are so worried about playing the wrong note or saying the wrong thing that we end up with nothing at all." - Jonah Lehrer (via Whiskey River, 10/22/2014)