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| Fool Me Once | |
| By tymalek | ||||||||
| 22 January 2007 | ||||||||
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This is a story I just finished. I'm not sure how the ending works. Any comment would be much appreciated. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” “Hindsight is 20/20.” These sayings, along with too many others, revolve around the idea that there is something that can be learned after a mistake has been made. They serve as reassurances created by the powerless to feel better about the future when their leaders screw up. “History repeats itself.” There is a reason, on the other hand, that this statement is used to such an unbearable degree. Unlike the other afore mentioned clichés, this actually rings true, often to a terrifying degree. Everyone has turned their backs on the past. If you claim to always keep the past in view then you must be watching with your ass while spewing sewage from your mouth. To drive my point home I have a little story to share with you. It’s more of a parable actually. It is not only to help illustrate my point but to also help put it in a perspective that nearly everyone can commiserate with. I like to refer to it as “The Parable of the Man with His Ass to the Past and His Mouth Spewing Shit.” One day a man named Ray finds himself on the renewing stretch of road that is his daily deliverance from the mundane job that he is bullied into living day after day. It is on this stretch of road, somewhere between the parking lot of his place of employment and his own driveway, that he is transformed from the Ray of the business world to the Ray of his family. Somewhere in the winding, often seemingly endless roads, Ray forgets about his reports and paperwork and focuses on his wife and children. This process is not as intimate as one may think. Ray is not alone while undergoing these changes. He is wedged somewhere among thousands of other people confined on this still road who are attempting to undergo these same changes. Only on this particular day Ray decided it would be worth going through the grueling hardships and obstacles necessary to secure an early punch-out time in order to avoid the rush hour traffic. After getting out on the free roads Ray cannot say he regrets the decision. The first few miles go flawlessly. Just as planned. With the music blasting he cares very little about anything else as the trees fly by, creating nothing more than scenery he wishes to be behind him. Ray has always considered himself a very compassionate man but when he thinks about the condition that this road is undeniably going to be in only a few moments from now he cannot help but laugh. It is only intensified when he imagines the looks on the faces of those “poor suckers.” “If only they had the foresight to secure an earlier getaway like me.” Ray says to himself. “But thank god they didn’t or I’d be just as screwed as them.” Our joyous traveler cannot remember the last time he felt this revitalized. “If only this could last.” he mumbles under his breath. But of course it cannot. For you see, Ray knew, like anyone else who has seen more than a couple movies, that in any good story the main character must meet some form of adversity. Parables not excluded. Of course Ray did not know he was a character in a tale, but he, just like all of us who are a product of those who came before us, was programmed to feel he was of some importance to the world. And in order to be of any importance Ray knew he was destined to meet adversity. His adversity came in the form of brake lights. As Ray barreled down the nearly empty highway he would give a friendly honk to each vehicle he passed to show a sign of comradery. A sign of congratulations from one wise man to another. With every passing mile it seemed he was honking more and more. It was not long before Ray was laying on his horn, joining the chorus of countless others in a sea of cars that stretched as far as the eye could see. Of course this little setback was not enough to discourage the outlook of our optimistic commuter. Ray had been in this situation many times before and was well aware that patience was all about the manipulation of time. Just pay it no attention. He had become something of a pro. When he took control of time there was no way it was going to bother him. But no matter how practiced he was in the art of ignoring time, there was no ignoring the channel 2 helicopter that hovered around the scene, confirming what Ray had known all along. I will spare you the pain of all the used up metaphors that have already been ascribed to the idea that time cannot be tamed. Because often times a drawn out tale can be just as unbearable as a traffic jam. What does need to be addressed though is the eventual state of mind that this incident put our increasingly upset voyager in. When it became clear he was in for the long haul Ray turned off the radio and decided to use this opportunity to get better acquainted with his own mind, but of course all thoughts were eventually brought back to the issue at hand. Judging from the time of day and the fact that the helicopter thought there was a story in this backup, Ray knew this was not the result of “natural congestion.” Not that mankind had left much room for any nature to take part in the scheme of things. Ray realized he sat in a manmade car on a manmade road being subjected to a manmade traffic jam. Nature had been squeezed out of the equation. Suddenly our progressively pessimistic pilgrim longed to be walking among the trees, the trees whose beauty cannot be fully comprehended when driving by at speeds accessible in a vehicle. At the same time he longed to return back to the days when much of the blame could still be placed on nature. The inability to rely on this accepting scapegoat was a manmade problem. Even the problems of nature were man made. “The earth is turning to shit!” If only it were as easy as cursing our luck for being placed on such a self-destructing planet. Unfortunately we have learned that the truth behind this seemingly malfunctioning giant rock is actually a manmade problem. Manmade problems. Now, instead of placing the blame on a giant mass of dirt, which would be much easier, we are forced to accept this burden of responsibility. Maybe even do something about it ourselves. Of course our weary wonderer is not concerned with these problems on such a global scale. His frustrations are focused on what’s directly in front of him, which at this particular moment is a rather rude license plate that is suggesting he “EATS HIT.” By this time Ray is aware of the fact that this accident, which currently has him straining just to refrain from rear-ending the asshole in front of him, is on the complete other side of the freeway. It is the knowledge that this is a manmade problem that would make it so easy to ruthlessly beat this person solely due to the vulgar instruction the license plate gave. Instead of hating nature, a victimless crime, Roy is now forced to inject an innocent face as the culprit of his time. “Who is the asshole who slams on his brakes after seeing two pieces of manmade machinery collide into each other?” he asks himself. “Doesn’t he feel like a dick? Because his total lack of compassion for those who follow behind him it is us who suffer further down the road.” “I wonder,” he continues “if just one person had the foresight to waive his right to slam on his brakes, if just one person would have cared about us who would surely suffer because of their ignorance, would others have followed? Wouldn’t there be pressure on those who were directly behind to follow suit?” Liken it to a similar situation where there is only one piece of pizza left and you know everyone else at the table is eyeing it just as intently. The selfish child in us all wants to be the one to have it but no one wants to be known as the asshole that actually did it. In the same way all these cars would pass, just dying to slow down and get a better look. What stops them? What would make all these cars pass without giving into their initial inclination? It would be the same thing that allows that pizza slice to sit there until it’s too cold and unappealing to even consider eating. It is the restraint human beings can show when trying to avoid being the despised. You would be amazed at what humanity would be willing to forfeit when challenged to be considerate of others, those to come further down the road. It may not be the direct result of altruism. The desire to give may not even have anything to do with it. It could be the result of nothing more than the selfishness of avoiding scrutiny that leads you to it. The truth is that your reasons have very little to do with it. All that’s important is that you do have the ability to exercise such restraint. As our hero imagined this perfect world where even traffic jams could be avoided by the actions of just one man or woman who had the compassion to just keep driving, he made a promise to himself. “I will always consider the impact my actions will have on others before carrying it out.” When traffic finally cleared out and our renewed adventurer found himself at the scene which proved to be so captivating it took 45 minutes to reach it, he awarded himself with the moral victory of not even looking. Not so much as a glance. He may have noticed that it was a red car and that it lay in a ditch but this was only noticed out of the corner of his eye, something he could not avoid. The feeling of accomplishment was intensified when, as he drove away, he avoided looking in his rearview mirror. While driving away, our celebratory conquistador turned up his manmade radio, getting lost in the manmade music streaming from his manmade subwoofers. The trees whipped by, appearing as nothing more than green and brown static, just something in the background that may as well not even be there. But along that forgettable backdrop something incredible occurred. As our heedless hiker continued along his path he encountered, on the opposite side of the road, an accident. And to think he would have missed all of the action if he hadn’t quickly stepped on his brakes.
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