One Minute Here, Gone Forever

"Silence propagates itself, and the longer talk has been suspended, the more difficult it is to find anything to say."

Samuel Johnson

Ahhhh, the Silent Treatment.  Is there any more satisfying way to act like a dick than to employ the4 beloved and much cherished Silent Treatment?  I'm angry but I'm not going to tell you why and even if you know why I'm not going to participate in trying to fix it.  While the Angry Response is an excellent coping tool in my estimation it pales when compared to the Silent Treatment.  I always tell SuperK: "If you're pissed at me let me know.  Don't make me guess."  I'd rather deal with it right up front.  It's the NO SNIPING rule.  If you want to throw me off a cliff please look me right in the eye and say calmly: "I'd like to throw you off a cliff."  THAT I can handle.  The guilt and fear over uncertainty is a lot worse than the quick pain of an explanation.

I was talking to the IT engineer who handled technical support in my sales area, a guy from New York City, and I was hemming and hawing about something, not getting to the point, trying to be pleasant and accommodating and in the course of things dragging out what was really a pretty simple matter when he interrupted me with: "What are you trying to say, Seaweed?  Just say it!"  In my memory I laughed out loud and here I am telling people the exact same thing today.  Don't make me guess - just tell me.

I have been thinking about the meditation which posits existence as the sky and thoughts as clouds drifting by - the sky stays, that's existence, while the clouds come and go, those are my thoughts.  Just watch them come and go.  The sky stays the same while the clouds constantly change.  I also like the analogy of watching the water flow by while sitting on the bank of a river.  Existence is the river - the river is always there, it's not changing or going anywhere - and the constantly changing water represents my thoughts.  Here one minute, gone the next.  Or maybe existence is the water and my thoughts are the river?  Or maybe existence is the bank I'm sitting on and the water is bullshit and all of a sudden I find myself a hundred yards away, crashing through thick forest and trying to figure out exactly what the fuck is going on?  "Where did the river go?" I yell.

That makes more sense.  That sounds like something I'd do.