You Can Fly

When there's a smile in your heart

There's no better time to start

It's a very simple plan

You can fly...

from 'Peter Pan'

When  J. M. Barrie wrote 'Peter and Wendy' about 1903, he official instructed humans in the art of flying. We all wanted to believe somewhere along the line of our lives that we could fly. Some dream about it and it feels so real, it takes our breath away. Sometimes we daydream about flying. 

We get in airplanes all the time, but it never feels the same. In fact it is the exact opposite of why we dream of flying. It confines us, controls us and makes us usually quite uncomfortable. Sometimes even sick. Flying does not feel like this.

Flying is freeing, it is exhilarating and if you do it right, you are one with the universe and you can feel harmony and peace like no where else.

And yes Wendy, you can fly. 

Let go, open your mind, you can fly. You might just not be able to fly the same way as a bird or a bat... but think past the obvious.

Remember when you were small. So many things were possible. You believed. Believe again. Believe in yourself.

Close your eyes and spin around on the lawn on a soft summer day and when you fall to earth you have changed how you feel. You are dizzy, light headed. flying can feel like this. And you learn in a simple version of an Irrefutable truth...

You have the power inside of you to alter the physical world just as you can your emotional state. Can you actually defy gravity? Yes, Wendy, you can. Not the same way a bird does, but remember what Peter Pan told Wendy... "Just think of a wonderful thought - come on, let's go"

Scuba divers know exactly what flying feels like. When we dive under and become accustomed to the pressure we become one with the ocean, a part of the sea.

When we find our buoyancy we can glide with very little effort, arms out stretched and open. The sea is an incredible place to find your balance. You feel like you are flying. It is breath taking and I assure you, you are flying.

Parasailing, wind surfing, diving, even snorkeling are all ways humans can fly. Who ever said flying was exclusively for the air?

Meditation, dreams, prayer, are all ways a euphoric feeling can be obtained... 

Happiness is a form of flight. That's why they call it a natural high.

So is love.

Remember that first kiss? Remember the first touch of someone you longed for and never thought they knew you were alive? Remember the moment your lips touched? You know you were flying and your feet never left the ground. There is palpable tangible power in love.

The enemy of your ability to fly is emotional resistance. An open heart is a powerful tool.

Laughter is real medicine.

You know all about a bodies’ resistance to physical attack in terms of germs, diseases and the like. But good human health is not a purely physical event. Naturally occurring physical immunities are of utmost importance. But have you given the same attention to your feelings and emotions?

Emotional health is as important and maybe even more so than physical in prevention of future illness. Emotional resistance to emotional attack is a learned experience. 

When the human body is born from the mother into the world, nature provides an extensive array of carefully honed natural progressions of protection.  But it's up to us to keep the laughter, the joy, the innocence, the love and the empathy that we are hopefully taught by example early on. 

So go laugh, go sailing, learn to dive, remember your happy place....    go flying.....

 

Why do people accuse sharks in the ocean, of infesting their own home?
There is no such thing as 'Shark Infested Waters' .

Do you call the local shopping mall "Human Infested"?

People get a good many things all wrong.

The headline read:

Oldest U.S. Man Dies of Heart Failure at 112

This made me sad.

At 112 years old no one dies of heart 'failure'.

This man's heart suffered no such failure.

This man's heart served him and very many others the way the rest of us wish we could be served by our hearts.

One hundred and twelve years, every second of every day, this man's heart beat faithfully.

He lived four years in the 19th century, 100 years in the 20th century, and 8 years in the 21st century. His heart did not fail him.

He lived through both world wars, man's first walk on the moon and the election of the first black president. As a black man in the South, he knew Jim Crow-era segregation laws. Shortly before his death, he voted for Barack Obama and watched him win the election. His heart certainly did not fail him then.

George Francis was born on June 6, 1896 in New Orleans. He had been an amateur boxer, a chauffeur, an auto mechanic and a barber. He had one wife, until her death. He never married anyone else. He had four children, 18 grandchildren, 33 great-grandchildren and 16 great-great grandchildren.

How can anyone say he died of heart failure?

His heart just finished and fell to sleep.
We should all be so fortunate.

One of Us...

When Tod Browning immortalized sideshow humans in his inimitable 1932 classic  "Freaks" , the great-unwashed masses felt a stir deep in the heart of Carny-dom.

One of us, One of us, One of us...

The word carny is thought to have become popularized around 1931 in North America, when it was first colloquially used to describe "one who works at a carnival." The word carnival, originally meaning a "time of merrymaking before Lent," Now the carnivals are all but gone and the sideshow freaks have taken center stage to become the main event.

In a bizarre coincidence, Wrestlemania, the glandular festival of knights, is held every year during Lent. More like a time of money-making during Lent, in this case.

One of us, One of us, One of us...

(If you have never seen the 1932 film "Freaks" you do not know this chant, but trust me, it applies to the WWE Corporation.)

Wrestlemania is the yearly finale to a relentless 12 month cycle of staged brutality and bad acting. The entire big top hoopla is the intellectually challenged brain child of the most successful carny of them all, Vince McMahon. 

Vince is a 3rd generation trailer park wrestling promoter and with his kids as the 4th generation carnies, are 95% share holders of the largest and wealthiest carnival side show ever conceived. While the business is built solely upon the lowest common denominator of violence between men, the corporation is run like a cult under charismatic dictators. Everyone who expects to stay in the employ of the great and powerful wizards must tote the party line, and be impressed, supportive and completely enamored of the family and of the  'sport' of pro wrestling. There shall be no snickering.

The family rule the WWE with iron fists and steel hearts. Employees are expected to counter act the inevitable perceptions of carni-ness with overly polite interactions to the point of nausea. An example is the demand that all employees greet any outsiders with big smiles, firm hand shakes and a bizarre requirement that they look the person directly in the eyes and no where else. The fraudulent and compulsory smiling aside, the regimented manor with which they interact is palpably laced with fear.

While the recession forced the corporation to have a 20% across the board layoff, the entire family puts on the Ritz and live the lush life in ways that make Donald Trump appear destitute. Not surprisingly, no amount of chiffon, leather, diamonds and pearls can disguise a carny this pure. The south has risen again and thy name is McMahon.

Basically, these 'shows' are a dramatized melodrama for a primarily blue-collar male audience with some puerile females along for the ride. Much like a soap opera for males. Sadly, there are very often small children in the audience as well. This is congruent to packing a lunch and bringing your family to a public lynching, then over paying for a hangman action figure and toy noose. Here little Billy, go and emulate the nice hangman.

Well, that is, if the public hanging is scripted, rehearsed, back-storied and involved an on going drama around the victim in which several other bad actors pretended to hang each other for the entertainment of the villagers and their mentally challenged children.

To be sure, one must be prepared for such an illustrious event. One must be somewhat naive, and easily entertained. And by easily, I mean if they were to walk past a shiny object, they might be too distracted to get out of the way of a neon painted charging elephant. 

That being said, these events can be a challenge to view if you have even the basic high school education. The less you are able to process as a thinking person, the more you will enjoy this carnival of human oddities. The McMahon family owes a great debt to PT Barnum to be sure. 

There is an over abundance of brightly colored oak tag signage splattered through out the audience at anyone of these events. Home made symbols of the height of literacy one may expect to attain in this environment. If the audience's tee shirts are not misspelled, consider it a banner evening for the English language.

Millions of dollars, thousands of man hours, hundreds of scripted lines of drivel and a few dozen doses of steroids all make for an amazing spectacle that rivals the most riveting beheading ever hosted at the London Tower.  But why?

Why do a vast majority of humans want to pay to see violence? Why is bad behaviour rewarded with fancy cars and oversized homes?  We may never know, but wouldn't the McMahon family have salivated to have lived when John Merrick was alive.