Fear
I'm counting seconds. I start off, nice and slow, lugubrious, but before I get to three I'm racing. "One....chimpanzee2chimpanze3chim", three short little hot chimpanzees before my eyes fly open. I'm on Highway 101 near San Francisco, trying to see how long I can drive with my eyes closed.
It freaks people out when I ask if they've ever driven on the freeway with their eyes closed. They give me The Look, and I know they think I'm some psycho death-wish loony. It's not about that at all, though. It's a triumph of reason over fear.
How it works: You wait until you've got a nice clear spot with no turns upcoming, lots of space in front of you and nobody driving wildly who might swerve in front of you and slam on the brakes. You look for potholes. You guess the odds of anything happening that would prevent you from holding a straight steady path for the length of the game. If you think there's any real chance of needing to react to something, you don't play. Reason has to be on your side, or else, yeah, death wish.
Then you close your eyes, and count seconds, "one chimpanzee, two chimpanzee..." You try to hold the pace, one chimpanzee per second, through your whole count. Try not to speed up. Try not to give in and open your eyes before your target count. On a really good day you can pass your target. I used to be able to do a solid 8 chimpanzees regularly, sometimes 10 on Highway 280 up north of Highway 92.
I'm trying it today, and the best I can do is those three short little hot chimpanzees. I was perfectly safe, of course. Nobody had cut in front of me. I still had a long way before the next car. I was square in the middle of my lane. I could have gotten away with 5 or 6 chimpanzees easy, but I just gave in to the fear.
And that's it, isn't it? Reason over fear. I'm always looking at the worst possible case, weighing odds, considering outcomes. People sometimes think I'm a pessimist. But it drives out the fear if you're prepared to face the worst. You have to arm your reason to overcome your fear.
Tonight I walked into the clubhouse of the East Bay Rats motorcycle club. It's a dingy little space in a warehouse district in Oakland. It's like someone's garage, with boxing gear and leather jackets and motorcycle parts stacked around the edges. There's a plywood bar, but it seems like a formality. At any point in time, anyone could be in front of the bar or behind it. I don't see any booze, I'm guessing that they only stock it for parties. There's a soda machine dispensing cans of beer for a dollar in one corner.
I'm here for a boxing lesson. They host open boxing lessons every Thursday. The club president, Trevor, is working with me. I'm starting from zero. He's good, but the real boxing coach is Kwesi, who's training with with a skinny little asian and a white guy with biceps the size of my head. Kwesi seems to really know his shit. "Rotate your shoulders on the jab, really get your obliques into it."
I didn't do very well, I ran out of steam pretty quickly. I was doing ok for awhile, about 15 minutes, but then I ran out of gas and I just couldn't recover between sets enough to make it worth Trevor's time. I'd jab, jab, cross, hook, two times, maybe three, then have to stop and gasp for breath. Before I ran out of steam though, I learned a lot. Gotta rotate the shoulders on the jab. Pivot on your foot for a hook.
After I wimped out, I chatted for awhile with Trevor. Trevor's a big solid guy, he works as a bouncer in the city. I really liked him, he's a decent guy with a lot of integrity and no fear. I could picture him being very intimidating. I could also picture him being completely mild mannered until the time came to tear you apart. Then calmly ripping you limb from limb.
I asked him questions about, what if you really need to protect yourself? What if you're out in the street and the shit goes down? What happens to the rules then? He gave me some great tips. Keep the other guy off balance. He's a bouncer, he always tries to defuse a situation when he's on the job. But otherwise, strike first, strike hard, give it all you've got, and keep the other guy off balance. If you lose, take it like a man, it only hurts for a while. If you lose to somebody once and are willing to fight him again next time, you'll have his respect.
But it's really all about managing your fear. Learning what the worst possible case is and learning that you can handle it. When I get started for real on learning to box, I need to get somebody to punch me in the face. I think that's the reason I want to take boxing instead of tae-kwon-do or some other martial art – at some point when you're learning boxing you're going to get punched in the face. I'm terrified of getting punched in the face, and I need to get over that. I'll bet it's not so bad. I need to train my reason to overcome fear.
And I had plenty of fear coming out here. I'm going to a MOTORCYCLE club. Like the Hell's Angels, people who kick each others asses just for fun. I didn't know if the whole club would be in, and if so, what would they think of this fat old chickenshit tourist? Was I walking into an ass-kicking? I had a bunch of chances to bail out on the way. With Bay Area traffic, torrential rains of biblical proportions, and getting lost in the Fruitvale ghettos it took a solid hour and a half driving to get there, the little voice nagging the whole way, "Are you sure you want to do this?" ,
But every time I'd want to chicken out, I'd think about likely results. Worst possible case? I'd get my ass kicked and end up in the hospital. But at least then I'd KNOW.
It freaks people out when I ask if they've ever driven on the freeway with their eyes closed. They give me The Look, and I know they think I'm some psycho death-wish loony. It's not about that at all, though. It's a triumph of reason over fear.
How it works: You wait until you've got a nice clear spot with no turns upcoming, lots of space in front of you and nobody driving wildly who might swerve in front of you and slam on the brakes. You look for potholes. You guess the odds of anything happening that would prevent you from holding a straight steady path for the length of the game. If you think there's any real chance of needing to react to something, you don't play. Reason has to be on your side, or else, yeah, death wish.
Then you close your eyes, and count seconds, "one chimpanzee, two chimpanzee..." You try to hold the pace, one chimpanzee per second, through your whole count. Try not to speed up. Try not to give in and open your eyes before your target count. On a really good day you can pass your target. I used to be able to do a solid 8 chimpanzees regularly, sometimes 10 on Highway 280 up north of Highway 92.
I'm trying it today, and the best I can do is those three short little hot chimpanzees. I was perfectly safe, of course. Nobody had cut in front of me. I still had a long way before the next car. I was square in the middle of my lane. I could have gotten away with 5 or 6 chimpanzees easy, but I just gave in to the fear.
And that's it, isn't it? Reason over fear. I'm always looking at the worst possible case, weighing odds, considering outcomes. People sometimes think I'm a pessimist. But it drives out the fear if you're prepared to face the worst. You have to arm your reason to overcome your fear.
Tonight I walked into the clubhouse of the East Bay Rats motorcycle club. It's a dingy little space in a warehouse district in Oakland. It's like someone's garage, with boxing gear and leather jackets and motorcycle parts stacked around the edges. There's a plywood bar, but it seems like a formality. At any point in time, anyone could be in front of the bar or behind it. I don't see any booze, I'm guessing that they only stock it for parties. There's a soda machine dispensing cans of beer for a dollar in one corner.
I'm here for a boxing lesson. They host open boxing lessons every Thursday. The club president, Trevor, is working with me. I'm starting from zero. He's good, but the real boxing coach is Kwesi, who's training with with a skinny little asian and a white guy with biceps the size of my head. Kwesi seems to really know his shit. "Rotate your shoulders on the jab, really get your obliques into it."
I didn't do very well, I ran out of steam pretty quickly. I was doing ok for awhile, about 15 minutes, but then I ran out of gas and I just couldn't recover between sets enough to make it worth Trevor's time. I'd jab, jab, cross, hook, two times, maybe three, then have to stop and gasp for breath. Before I ran out of steam though, I learned a lot. Gotta rotate the shoulders on the jab. Pivot on your foot for a hook.
After I wimped out, I chatted for awhile with Trevor. Trevor's a big solid guy, he works as a bouncer in the city. I really liked him, he's a decent guy with a lot of integrity and no fear. I could picture him being very intimidating. I could also picture him being completely mild mannered until the time came to tear you apart. Then calmly ripping you limb from limb.
I asked him questions about, what if you really need to protect yourself? What if you're out in the street and the shit goes down? What happens to the rules then? He gave me some great tips. Keep the other guy off balance. He's a bouncer, he always tries to defuse a situation when he's on the job. But otherwise, strike first, strike hard, give it all you've got, and keep the other guy off balance. If you lose, take it like a man, it only hurts for a while. If you lose to somebody once and are willing to fight him again next time, you'll have his respect.
But it's really all about managing your fear. Learning what the worst possible case is and learning that you can handle it. When I get started for real on learning to box, I need to get somebody to punch me in the face. I think that's the reason I want to take boxing instead of tae-kwon-do or some other martial art – at some point when you're learning boxing you're going to get punched in the face. I'm terrified of getting punched in the face, and I need to get over that. I'll bet it's not so bad. I need to train my reason to overcome fear.
And I had plenty of fear coming out here. I'm going to a MOTORCYCLE club. Like the Hell's Angels, people who kick each others asses just for fun. I didn't know if the whole club would be in, and if so, what would they think of this fat old chickenshit tourist? Was I walking into an ass-kicking? I had a bunch of chances to bail out on the way. With Bay Area traffic, torrential rains of biblical proportions, and getting lost in the Fruitvale ghettos it took a solid hour and a half driving to get there, the little voice nagging the whole way, "Are you sure you want to do this?" ,
But every time I'd want to chicken out, I'd think about likely results. Worst possible case? I'd get my ass kicked and end up in the hospital. But at least then I'd KNOW.
posted by Swampdog at 5:11 PM
1 Comments:
Hey!. You're an idiot. An irresponsible fool. If I knew you, I'd torch your car.
I can only pray that a 48 wheel Kenworth juggernaut hits you head-on, and crushes you into an unrecognisable paste - something like ground up spam mixed with shit. So messy that you have to be hosed out of the wreck.
The world would become a better place that day.
Or alternatively, you could just top yourself.
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