Why do you have to be a chatterbox ordinarily, but when it comes to actually talking a person's head off, you suddenly fall silent and give off an impression that you're just not into it? Why, O Cruel World? How can you have a million questions buzzing around in your head at one moment, and go blank the next? Is that the sign of an amnesiac? A psychopath? A serial-killer psychopath?
Oooh... I dunno. I certainly might turn into one considering I've to reach college by 7:00 in the morning. How am I supposed to reach college? The metro. Does the metro run so early? I think it does. But seriously, do I want to go on an eerily empty metro, thinking that a nutcase is waiting around the corner to strangle me to death the whole time? Though I doubt a nutcase would ever even get up that early trying to find victims to strangle on eerily empty metro trains. Bah!
Anyway, I've to go help with the decorations for the moot court tomorrow. There will be rangoli and god knows what else. I'd rather spill fake blood all over the stage and place fake corpses in strategic places. And when the delegates enter the auditorium, slam the doors shut, throw the place into complete darkness and play a chilling tune in the background. And throw spider-webs over them from the balcony. And lizards. And alligators with creepy little eyes.
I'm gonna have so much fun :D
Once upon a time, a man died and went up to Heaven, where Saint Peter was waiting for him at the Holy Gates.
“I’m very sorry,” said Saint Pete, “but I can’t let you in.”
The man was shocked and very disappointed. “Why not, Saint Peter?” he asked. “Wasn’t I a good man on Earth?”
“You were a very good man, indeed,” replied Saint Pete.“But here’s what your problem was – you could not stop yourself from telling other people how to lead their lives. If they were making a mistake of some kind, you felt compelled to point it out to them.”
Once again, the man was shocked by Saint Peter’s words. “But I don’t understand, Saint Peter. Why was this a bad thing? I was just trying to help them. Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do on Earth - help people?”
“Not in this instance,” replied Saint Peter sternly. “You never learned to mind your own business. And for that reason, I’m afraid you’ll have to go to Hell.”
The man pleaded with Saint Pete. “Please, Saint Peter, I didn’t mean any harm. I was just trying to help, that’s all. I didn’t know I was doing a bad thing. Please, please, give me another chance?”
Saint Peter looked at the man and could see that he honestly hadn’t meant any harm. Because that was so, he thought that perhaps he might bend the rules…just this once. However, before he did, he would test the man’s sincerity. Unbeknownst to the man, of course.
“All right,” decided Saint Pete. “I’ll go to the Higher Ups and see what I can do. In the meantime, you wait in that room over there. Just go in, and close the door behind you.”
The room to which the man had been directed was large and empty, save for a bench. As directed, he closed the door as he went in, and sat on the bench, waiting for his verdict. And as he sat, he noticed there was a narrow, open archway which led to an anteroom at the far side, opposite to where he was sitting.
As he was pondering what might be in the anteroom, the door he’d closed opened, and an angel came in. He was carrying a very tall ladder.
“Hello,” said the angel. “I hope I’m not disturbing you. Do you mind if I come through? I’ve just got to take this ladder and leave it in that anteroom over there.”
“Please, go right ahead,” said the man. “You don’t need my permission.”
And then, an odd thing happened. The man watched as the angel walked across the room towards the anteroom, turned his ladder horizontally in his arms, and attempted to walk through the narrow archway with it. Naturally, he was unable to get through, as the ladder held horizontally was now much too wide.
The man observed with incredulity as the angel made attempt after attempt to get through the archway while holding the ladder thusly. Each time, the ends of the ladder banged against the wall on either side of the opening, propelling the angel backwards, and making quite a mess of the walls it kept hitting, in the process.
Naturally, after about fifteen minutes of this, the angel was winded and perspiring.
“Whew!” he exclaimed. “I didn’t realize this was going to be so difficult.”
The man couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Are you serious?” he blurted. “If you want to get through, hold the damn ladder vertically!”
The angel shook his head and looked at the man regretfully. “My friend," he said, “this ladder’s not damned, but you are.”
And the next thing the man knew, he was in Hell.
_______________________
I can’t remember how old I was when my father told
me the story above, but I was still young enough that
my questions were only just starting to become
annoying to him. Those questions were on every
subject from “Why do you support the war in Vietnam?”
to “Why don’t you ever do anything to stop all the
terrible things going on in this house?”
Since he couldn’t seem to come up with any reasonable
answers for me, the parable above was an attempt to
stave off the inevitable, which was that my
questioning of him would eventually go
from annoying to unbearable… for both of us.
Even my response to this story was not what he’d
hoped. He thought I’d feel forewarned that my quixotic
nature was taking me closer to Hades every day. But
ironically, all it prompted was another litany of
questions: “What kind of angel is stupid enough to
behave like a human?” and “What kind of God would
send a man to Hell for questioning human stupidity?”
It wasn’t until many, many years later that I recognized
that my father had a point, though perhaps not in the
way he’d believed. Anyone at all, with an average
human intelligence, understands very well which
way one needs to hold a ladder in order to get it
through a narrow archway. But pretending that he
doesn’t, he accomplishes one thing – he can tell himself
he tried to get through with everything he had and
just couldn’t succeed.
The fact is, he doesn’t want to succeed. He says
he has to get through a door and deposit a ladder in
an anteroom, but he doesn’t truly want to.
He just wants to pretend to himself and everyone
else, that he really, really tried.
And because this is actually what he wants – that
illusion of the attempt of a completion of a 'task', which is
another word for a ‘change’ – rather than the actual
change – he doesn’t want anyone to point out to him
that his ‘attempt’ is in actuality no attempt at all.
He doesn’t need anyone getting in the way of
his self-deception. Like my father, it will more
than irritate him, because by pointing it out, making him aware that you are aware that he’s lying to himself, you will make him hate himself and, as a result, (especially if your own attempts at change are real, and your desire to help him is motivated out of genuine caring, rather than smug superiority) – he will hate you, too.
A fast way to hell, indeed.
Remember that the next time you
(metaphorically) observe an intelligent adult holding a ladder horizontally, trying to get through an archway.
Say nothing. Wish him “good luck,” and get out of his way.
---------------------
I'm sorry I can't answer comments here. They are not possible to answer due to a software glitch on my page, which has now even begun to affect the appearance of my blogs. It's degenerative, I swear.And very irritating.
If you'd like to leave me a message, please visit patriciavolonakisdavis.wordpress.com. Thank you very much.
Kzinti and Baria - thank you for your comments over at my wordpress blog. They meant a lot. I miss you.
Live Footage of Ashley Hicklin & The Troubadours rehearsing new song "She Is Love" -Home Studios in Hamburg...
Hello Vox Neighbours!
Remember me? I sort of live here still... when VOX gives me permission to post, and when I'm not working endless hours on Lord-only-knows-what. (In fact, right now, VOX is not letting me change font sizes. I have come to loathe this software)
One of the things I've been up to, is the epic-making of this four minute vid, badly shot by me, using my computer, (a first) with my intern's help. It took all day, believe it or not, and it's still awful. I take full responsibility. It's through no fault of my intern, honestly. She showed me how to work all the buttons, how to "redirect the folder" (which I know I won't remember a second time), and she was cheering me on from off-camera. She shall remain publicly unnamed however, because - as you will see - she's amazingly publicity-shy.
Anyway, this is the Drawing Result for the contest we held on the Harlot's Sauce Facebook Fan Page and which I posted here, also, a while back. I know some of you were entered, and I was super-stoked when I realized that the winner is someone we all know and love. It took about thirty seconds to make the connection between her real name and her VOX name.
I admit that of all the things we've been doing lately to promote my book, running this contest was one of the fun ones. But discovering who the winner was really put it over the top on the enjoyment scale for me.
Congratulations to one very special human being.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-fEArRxYYQ
Also, for those who might be interested - (though my guess is by now, you're probably not, since I'm getting pretty sick of all this stuff, so I can imagine how you feel - here is my just-about-ready new book cover. I know the designers worked very hard on it, and I think it's a lovely work and a job well-done. The interior however, remains pretty much the same, except for the routing out of a few more typos; credit for the detection of which goes to my old pal, SNOWY. ('Sidney' indeed. I never spelled it like that - that was some sort of copyediting software, I swear!)
And now, back to work! : )
Have you seen 'Breakfast at Tiffany's'? There's a part where she tells Peppard about the mean reds, when she ends up going to Tiffany's because it comforts her so much. My comfort during my mean reds are my mom n friends. I had one last Thursday. It was just a silly thing, but I suppose I took it rather hard. Just when I crashed rock-bottom and I wanted to call up a gangmate, that my mom called. And it felt amazing talking to her.
I hate the mean reds. But I love talking to people really close to me when I'm in such a mood. I love them :)
Just a quickie to say I have succumbed to twittering :)
It's official! We signed the final paperwork for our record deal with Ferryhouse Productions / Warner Music! All very exciting. There will be a signing video on-line shortly. 2010 is gonna be a fun year working with this team. Looking forward to touring the record, which is starting to sound wwwwwwicked. Franz Plasa is a musical genius!
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