28 September 2000 ~ The unexpected...

As I said yesterday, I firmly believe that one should do something unexpected at least once a week. Preferably once a day, but that can get a little tiring...

I decided this one afternoon as I was walking home from the mall and decided to stop into a Christian bookstore. WHY did I decide to stop into the Christian bookstore? Was I seeking a higher meaning? Well, perhaps in a way I was... But not in the traditional sense of turning to the Christians for spiritual uplift; OBVIOUSLY Helena Thomas isn't so predictable, particularly since she was listening to a song called "Nietzsche's Eyes" on her discman as she opened the door...

WHY did I go into the Christian bookstore?

Well, first, I'll tell you what I found inside...

Of course, there were multitudes of Bibles and books and things... And CD's... And jewelry, mostly laden with engraved chalises and crucifixes... And keychains labelled "WWJD?" I giggled at those, and imagined myself fashioning a keychain for myself engraved with "WWFD?": What Would Ferris Do?

I found pendants with tiny pro-life symbols on them. Those pendants profoundly disturbed me, and I think they were the part of the visit which affected me most. I found myself feeling VERY pro-life, as a matter of fact; thinking that I could never endure an abortion, that... I don't even know WHAT I was thinking, particularly since I fully support a woman's right to choose... The pro-life stuff really bugged the shit out of me.

At the counter, two sales-clerks were arguing about the devil. I SWEAR this on a stack of Songs Of Solomon (the most interesting part of the Bible, for me at least), they were truly arguing about the devil, thus: "Well, I think that if you open yourself up to the love of God, temptation is useless and the devil can't reach your soul..." "Well, I still think we must endure temptation and the devil's call before the Lord Jesus Christ will accept us into the Kingdom of Heaven; we must not HEED to the call of the devil..."

Wow. Uh... As fascinating as I find religion-freaks, I thought that was probably my exit-cue... I felt quite a bit like the devil then and there, and hit the "reverse" button on my discman to listen to "Nietzsche's Eyes" again...

The point wasn't that I did not find some lost part of my own soul in the Christian bookstore. The point was that I found out I hadn't lost a THING in my absence of Christian-faith, which was revelation enough.

Next, I walked through an underpass while a train was overhead. And I screamed as loudly as I could into the underpass. It didn't really make much difference, because the train-sounds were pretty muffled, and all you could hear was me yelling...

Last night, I decided I hadn't engaged myself in enough unexpected activities... So, upon finding a fairly nice pair of sunglasses on the ground, I put them on in place of my regular glasses, and walked to work.

First, I will let you know that I am almost entirely blind without my glasses, and I never take them off. Even in the shower, I leave them on until they get steamy and I can't see anymore. At night, I leave them on until I turn out the bedroom lights. Once, I was dared to take my glasses off and walk from one end of my high school to the other. Guided, of course. I couldn't do it. I started crying and panicking. Being unable to see is a horrifying prospect, and most people take sight completely for granted.

I walked a mile in dark sunglasses. And then I walked home in the darkness with the same sunglasses on. I crossed busy intersections, relying only on my sense of sound to tell me whether cars were coming or not. I literally could not see cars more than twenty feet away.

Strangely, I didn't panic. As a matter of fact, it sort of relaxed me. Everything felt surreal. My movement felt like an amusement ride at Disneyland: you know you're not REALLY going to hit the asteroids coming at you on the movie screen, but you duck anyway. You know you're only moving a little bit, but it feels like you're being jolted every which way. Walking blindly down Clinton Street had a similar effect: I felt as though my steps were mechanical, as though I wasn't really walking at all, just being shifted around. I was suddenly aware of things I'd never been aware of: how each muscle feels when it's subjected to exercise; how grass can kind of look like dinosaurs, and the Jarvis Street underpass looks like a big gothic cathedral instead of a nasty, feces-infested underpass. Smells and sounds were suddenly very clear. Streetlights and house-lights became large round bubbles, and each had a distinct color. I was very aware of EVERYTHING.

I think my experiment for next week will involve finding a good book and curling up in a chair at, oh, maybe a bank or something, and reading quietly there, because nobody expects you to be reading at a bank.

WHY should one do something unexpected once a week?

I don't know. I don't want to know why, or what I'm trying to prove. Maybe I'm not trying to prove anything, or to find anything. Maybe I'm trying to embrace the Freak in me... Maybe... aw fuck, who cares... It's weird and I know it, and I guess that's the whole point...

Off to work...
~Helena*