Something That Happened.

I didn't know what to write, so I began to simply type as much as I could. I typed and typed. I wrote what I could in the speed that I comfortably could -- that is, I wrote swiftly, though not as swiftly as I possibly could -- and I composed nothing of particular value, and nothing that required any measure of consideration. I just typed, in the hopes of getting something accomplished. What that was, I did not know.



Did it work? Perhaps. Perhaps not. It certainly provided me with something to do as I sat there, too caffeinated and too self-conscious. I didn't produce any major works of art. I didn't write anything terribly inspiring. My short story, the first chapter of my novel, the central thesis of my prize-winning essay -- all that would have to come another day. I didn't write anything I could take home to my mother -- or at least, to mom's nursing home -- certainly nothing worthy of reading aloud, "Here ma, look at what I wrote! Listen to this..."



Still, I felt I'd accomplished something, if only an insignificant item that wouldn't warrant even an entry on a weblog. I had erased myself for a few minutes, forgotten that I was sitting there, jittering from an overload of coffee and in full view of everyone walking through the doors of the cafe. I think that's all I really wanted, to forget myself for a few minutes. There were other ways of doing this, sure, but I wasn't any good at them. Some folks meditate, but I couldn't forget myself while meditating. I was always aware of my body -- its minor aches and itches, the sense of its mechanisms, the smell of my armpits. I've been told that some people, in order to induce the meditative state, focus exclusively on their breathing -- or simply the sound of their breathing -- in order to lose self-absorption. Yet I always grew anxious when attempting to do so. Whenever I performed any breathing exercises, I would become too aware of my lungs, my heart pumping, my breath exhaling. Rather than losing awareness of myself, I would become irritatingly aware of every mechanism involved in my act of breathing. Some might think this would be evidence that I was achieving my goal -- but I assure you, dear reader, that I was never able to lose myself when concentrating on anything bodily, as it would inevitably lead my mind to unsettling matters. In the case of my breathing, my mind would begin to grow anxious contemplating the effects of my renewed smoking habit, the genetic possibility of pulmonary disease, the potential ulcer being induced by these very concerns, et cetera...



So meditation, or any form of Inactivity, wasn't for me. Then there were folks who could forget themselves in the act of performing the opposite: Extreme Activity. These folks ran. They hiked, or they mountain-climbed. They swam, they surfed. They sky-dived, they bungie-jumped. They raced cars, they chased cars. They crashed cars. They lost themselves completely in the extreme activities in which they were engaged. So absorbed in these acts, they were no longer "in their heads", their minds concentrated on accomplishing the outstanding feats in which they were engaged. All of these activities required either physical endurance or some amount of money, neither of which I was in possession of. I wasn't fit, physically or financially, for Extreme Activity. Besides, had I the ability to engage in these acts, it is more likely that my neuroticism would have compelled me to worry myself to a heart attack -- that is, through worrying about worrying myself into a heart attack. That's simply how my mind works.

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