Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Just A Hunch
Under the delicious deluge of autumn rain this morning, I (umbrella-less) hunched my shoulders as I scooted from parking garage to street to sidewalk to building entranceway, a short distance.
Did the hunching help?
Did it make me less wet? Did I think hunching would protect me?
Hunch. A great word. Merriam-Webster declares its origin unknown.
Hunch conjures up combinations of huddle and scrunch and hump, which if performed simultaneously would tie one up in potentially orgasmic-enhancing or orgasmic-squelching knots. (Take your pick.)
The fecklessness-of-hunching metaphor raises this question (or raises nothing at all, if one is rendered impotent by such contortions):
What other hunch illusions do we fall for?
After all, does your flinching matter as the I-beam sliding off the semi slices through your windshield?
That sounds dark and gloomy, but isn't, really.
It is meant to underscore the illusion of power we live by, afraid to surrender to the reality of powerlessness. We do this as individuals and as a culture (and as a government).
Powerlessness is really such a relief.
Alas, easier said than done.
My letting go (or failure to do so) typically leaves a bloody trail of claw marks on the object of desire.
(Pare it down, and you've got a Leonard Cohen song or poem.)
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6 comments:
Great thought!!!
And yes, sticking my tongue out of the side of my mouth while I chop the vegetables gets it done faster! haha!
But over the years I have learned, thanks to others that came before me to let the big things go. Life is so much easier now that I've "pared it down".
Thanks for a great post!
I'm with Miss Odat. This is a great post, PK. The wildfires in SoCal underscore our powerlessness in the universe. We do what we can the rest is beyond our grasp.
When I read about your hunch, I thought a bunch...
Tortilla chips I like to munch.
They offer one something on which to crunch.
Looking at my watch I have a hunch
That soon it will be time for lunch.
A poem for you
That's not haiku.
I crossed that same rainy sidewalk and the same glistening street, only with my face upturned and a spring in my step. I do more than my share of hunching at my desk.
Didn't your mother ever tell you that if you don't stop doing that you will stick that way some time?
Once you get stuck in a hunch you will have to move to Notre Dame. I would assume that all of the hunch huts at the original church in Europe are currently taken from stuck hunchers so, you would have to move to some little church down the road from Notre Dame college here in the U.S. until something more appropriate opens up in Europe.
Maybe they have a waiting list for hunch quarters. Do the Notre Dame Hunchers work In shifts?
Just a thought.
Later Y'all.
great post - and it does look like you are becoming quite the subtle activist...smile
Without the illusion of power, so much of what we do is revealed as utterly poitnless.
Time to let go.
Puss
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