Wednesday, May 23, 2012

The enemy of my enemy is I hate the ocean.

If the only thing we have to fear is, fear itself, it stands to reason that the majority of the things the average person is afraid of...is irrational.

I recently watched a show that went into the statistical analysis of how likely you are to die in a plane crash as opposed to a car crash. Despite overwhelming evidence that plane travel is immensely more safe, people who are quite happy to hop in their car every day are afraid of flying. I am one of those people.

There are people who lose it at the sight of a snake or a spider, any bug at all, a mouse or rat. Statistics say the family dog is more likely to kill you than a snake.

The dark is a very big fear for lots of people. As we all know, everything scary happens in the dark.

If something exists, someone else is probably afraid of it. I was gonna say there's someone out there probably afraid of me, but it dawns on me that they probably aren't afraid of me so much as being afraid of the fact that I'm left handed....SIDE NOTE TIME!

For centuries religious and cultural practices have deemed left hand users inferior. The word itself is derived from the word lyft, an Anglo-Saxon word meaning "weak." During the times of corporal punishment in schools, teachers would often beat students caught using their left hand. In many third world countries where toilet paper is an issue, the left hand is considered the "unclean hand" since it's the taught method to use your left hand to clean...yourself....after a nice trip to brown town. It's said that those who fall out of favor with god stand to his left, which led to a variety of religious based nicknames for various groups...all which included the word "left." Even today, the concept of forced conversion to becoming right hand dominate, is very common. Which has proven widely unsuccessful and often leads to several developmental issues. People are really stupid.

...anyhow...people are probably also afraid of my red hair, which of course means I have no soul.

Outside of flying, I do have one other fear. The ocean. The ocean and I have had a long term hate-hate relationship. Growing up in Florida, a short drive from several beaches, I certainly had a fair number of visits to the ocean. So over the years, as you might expect, I had some bad moments. When I was very young, I got knocked over by a big (big for a tiny little fella) wave. I didn't like that very much. On a visit with my Church's Youth Group, a bunch of us went out pretty far and had the pleasure of meeting a shark. I've never swam so fast to shore. I feel Olympic swimmers should compete in a pool that has sharks, to get the best possible times. One time I had my hand cut open by...something...in the water. I don't even have a clue what it was, and I got probably a 4 inch long slice across my right palm. How's that for unclean, right handers?

My biggest fear concerning the ocean would certainly be sharks. Maybe it traces back to the time I first saw the Sarlacc in Star Wars, but the idea of being eaten alive just never sat well with me, and experts have found that sharks investigate new things with a bite. Just because the shark may eat me on accident, doesn't mean I have to be okay with it. It's difficult, because like anything, I don't want my hang ups to transfer to William and Carter for no other reason but, "Daddy doesn't like that." I don't want to be the reason they don't eat veggie burgers, I want them to find out how gross they are all on their own. It's not very fair to cast judgement on sharks when they really haven't ever done anything to me at all.

Then I saw this:

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/15/11721176-yikes-great-white-shark-attacks-fishermans-kayak?lite

To be honest, I stopped watching at about the 47 second mark. Right when the guy said "Sharks don't like people. Sharks don't like to eat people."

Now I know what he said is true, because he was on a news report, standing by the water. This makes him credible as an expert. Also he forgot to button his left shirt pocket. So obviously he's got a knack for details.

Well, I am shocked. They don't like us?! I can be down right delightful. That's really not cool. We send all these nice people out into their home to place tracking tags on them...We give them things to play with and eat like license plates and hubcaps...We even immortalize them by making movie after movie where they (well CGI versions I guess) are always in a major role. I don't understand what else people have to do to get on their good side. I'm just gonna say it, sharks are ass holes.

On the other hand, they have to be good parents. I mean, they don't like to eat people, and yet they do. William never eats his green beans for me. I wonder what kind of reward or punishment system they are using.

4 comments:

  1. Erin won't listen anymore to my side notes on my special-ness, be it my awesome left hand or my red hair.

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    1. You may know this story, but when I was at UCF, a girl came up behind me yelling, "Chuck! Chuck!" When I turned around I saw the familar dissapointed look that women in those days typically gave me. She said, "Oh, sorry I thought you were my friend Chuck File. Do you know him?" The fact that she thought all red heads were likely to know each other, made me sad. The fact that I knew Chuck, made me even more sad. She walked away with like, confirmation or something.

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  2. I was on said trip to beach when shark was encountered...to this day am convinced that they live and prey on people in every square inch of the ocean. Evan, your blog is great, I love it!

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    1. That was simply crazy, and I absolutely love your thought process! They're just swimming around waiting..."Bound to be some human that comes along sooner or later." Glad you are enjoying it! (Always feel free to pass it along to folks) Hope all is well!

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