(Possible Journal Entry)
Day 1.
Let me begin this diary with a quick explanation of who I am. I could bore you with details, tell you about my hobbies, idle dreams and accomplishments, but this would really bring you no closer to me. I hope to illustrate a good bit of who I really am, my most basic essence, in this entry.
Throughout my life so far, there has been one repetitive scene playing out constantly in different scales and settings. I have felt thus far, to be the stereotypical character so commonly found in funny movies who is convinced strongly of one thing, finds he is wrong and reacts in graceless shock,...for a goodly portion of the foundations of his logical world has just been removed. He is lost as his own reality collapses in on him. Let me give you a good example of my type of people:
A trim and decently elegant 46 year old man. Whitened hair is made up for with it's own thickness. Clearly a man with the world figured out... a neat freak, but clearly already a powerful man in his own economic and intellectual right whose status is ever rising. He walks confidently up to the public urinal and picks a spot next to a friend of his. They make quick small talk, some yellow water, zip up and proceed to what serves as the lavatory checkout aisle. Our man lathers up as enthusiastically as a top-crack young surgeon, preparing to perform a record-breaking procedure. The first full brain transplant or some modern nonsense. He then begins shaking his hands briskly and continues shaking his hands. He efficiently fingers the door open with a handkerchief, shaking all the while. His friend skips the heavy soaping, and wipes quickly on some paper towels. As they step outside, his friend speaks: "Why do you always insist on shaking your hands like a panicking catholic nun in distress when there are perfectly clean paper towels?"
Our man, perfectly calmly and with the mildest hint of derision: "Do you have any idea of the amount of fecal germs splattered on your "perfectly clean" paper towels?"
(Here's the punch-line, so pay attention)
His friend, evenly: "You know Tom, that's something I've thought about, and it occurred to me that since the germs are traveling through the air on their way to being splattered on the towels, waving your hands will collect as many little filthy bits of nastiness directly on your skin as using the towels. In fact, I'm careful to wipe with the side of the towel which was folded inward, guaranteeing that it is clean and sanitary, free of any disgusting germs."
Our man will now react humorously in extreme disbelief. One of his primary tenets of life had just been soundly demolished by a man he felt far superior to. His shocking crash down from the clouds is highly entertaining for the audience. A witty piece of writing, that scene, for whoever writes it in one version or another.
The part of that story that is never considered is that of my feelings during the event. I am miserable, and my sense of esteem and perception of the world are devastated at the exact moment that I had truly become confident in them. So it is... again and again. I fear disillusionment constantly, and am bothered by the nagging knowledge that I will never know anything that is basically true, only a false sense of confidence in a idea that is impossibly flawed, yet to my unfortunate eyes, glimmers like the Hope diamond.
