[All drugged up while on a plane because I’m afraid of flying, this story popped into my brain waiting for the plane to do its thang…chicken wang]
As she sat there waiting for the plane to stop rolling all over the tarmac and just pick a direction and GO, the girl realized that it was all in her mind. The plane wasn’t going to take off until she had done certain things. Kinda like the way she used to believe in 5th grade that if she didn’t hold her breath for 20 seconds while skipping in place then the guy she had a crush on in Ms. Marquez’ class wouldn’t like her. In order for the plane to take off, it was up to her to slow down her breathing like Andrew Huberman, the podcast guru of neuroscience, was always telling everyone to do all the time. And she had to visualize the plane enveloped in a white puffy cloud of safety just like the writer Ross Gay had mentioned he did every time he flew. Slow. The F. Down. And. You. Can. Calm. Down.
She knew that the plane would just keep circling and circling and driving too fast down the runway without taking off until she had done these very specific things. And that’s when she also realized that everything is also connected. Kinda like in an Everything Everywhere All At Once sort of way but without the fighting-your-arch-enemy-across-space-and-time added touch. She realized that everything that was happening TO her could be seen as a projection. A figment of her own imagination. And what if we were all just figments of each other’s imaginations existing in our own little space bubbles? Nobody outside yourself really exists. And everything that happens, from that that stunning person we can’t stop staring at who is supposed to check our driver’s license and plane ticket as we go through airport security and who has eyeshadow going from the top of their eyelids all the way up and past their eyebrows but who doesn’t really care what our tickets says… to that person we keep rescuing from life when it gets too difficult but we are slowly learning to stop rescuing AS MUCH, all of these people are just an externalization of different parts of our selves and we could CHOOSE very different people to be if we just realized it’s up to us to take a different path. Then again, if we actually did take a different path, would it make any difference really if we haven’t stopped long enough to look at ourselves to understand ourselves? Maybe.
Maybe if I could figure out why I like to save people then I’d stop trying to ‘make things better’ for people when things got even a little uncomfortable. Like when my friend got squeamish about going to a movie alone so I offered to go with them even though it would have been a good for them to learn how to take themselves out on a date but I wasn’t up for explaining all that so I caved in and went with them even though I wasn’t that excited about the movie they picked. But maybe it was good that I did that because sometimes it’s ok to help people just as long as you know what your reasons are for doing it.
I’m remembering my cat now and how sometimes his foot will rest lightly on my foot while he lies down on the carpet next to me. It feels good. He knows I’m close. I know he’s close but we’re both doing our own thing. His paws are dirty with dust from the yard that is too dry. I’m trying to savor each day more because that’s the main thing that makes sense to me lately: savoring. I don’t know why else I’m here on this planet.
And finally, then, the plane takes off.