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pm 6:25 Sunday 8 February 2004
"People are into control and fear and buying things,"
David said in Friday's secret meeting. That makes total sense to
me. I got this idea to write a book a person could carry around
with them, to look up how to defend themselves with words while
they're out and about, sort of a "Field Guide to Non-escalating
Verbal Self-Defence," and polished the whole thing off in two
intense months. That's control. Then I spent two months living on
the edge between the workaday world and sleeping, until the part
of me that dreams at night reappeared. Now that's the opposite of
control.
I've never had any trouble with fear, because I've always seen
it as sort of an adrenaline trip, more a temporary influence than
something to identify with. If I'm feeling frightened, I simply
turn around inside myself and give myself comfort. Something from
my childhood, I tell myself, and there's nothing in the here-and-now
to be frightened of. I'm here with you, I tell myself, and I can
take care of you. Understanding seems to be the opposite of fear.
Now buying things is a whole other matter. If I weren't forty thousand
dollars in debt I'd be out buying things right now. I really need
a new BMW, a rear-projection TV, two new blankets from L. L. Bean,
and a bunch of furniture. I could do that tomorrow.
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