I just got back from a visit to the doctor, where tests were done and health was assessed in a manner one would expect from a doctor within this context. It's natural to think about mortality and experience existential angst after a visit to the hospital, but I do it every few weeks so the experience has been robbed of that currency with me. I'm insane, and I suffer from various hormonal disorders, so I'm comfortable with being poked and prodded. Sometimes there is an ad on television for a tractor pull somewhere in western Massachusetts ("Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!"), and that causes me extreme neurotic anxiety. Actually, that sort of anxiety is common with me, just not associated with doctors.
When I was walking back from the clinic, however, something happened that made me think about the big questions. Some roofers were working on, well, a roof. They were peeling shingles off the roof of this building and flinging the debris onto the sidewalk below. It's hot out, like Africa hot, so the tar is really sticky. Since the sidewalk is roped off, they weren't worried about hitting fat people walking nearby. Naturally, a shingle caught some air and went sailing into my head. I said, "What the fuck?" Had it been a chunk of blue ice or a clumsy roofer, those would have been my last words. More like, "What the...?" Instead, I just had a ball of tar in my hair that I promptly washed out when I got home. Unlike that black chick from "The Apprentice," I just walked it off.
It got me thinking about how we are all hanging onto life by a thread, and how at any moment we could have our final, "What the fuck?!" moment. It's a great reaction to have, though. It really speaks to the bumbling confusion that goes along with being human. Life can be summed up with a series of exclamations, from birth to death. I'll give it a try.
FIFTEEN STATEMENTS THAT SUM UP THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE
1. "Wah!" (little baby)
2. "I can hardly wait to start school!" (age 4)
3. "School is a fucking nightmare, I can't wait to graduate." (age 5-22)
4. "Nobody is hiring except McDonald's...I'm going back to college." (if you're lucky, skip to end)
5. "I hate this fucking job." (from the first time you punch-in until you retire or die)
6. "I wonder if I should join the army?" (potential fast-track to statement #15)
7. "Of course I love you." (or "I love you, do you love me?" Could happen anytime)
8. "Pregnant? Oh, fuck me...fuck me!!!!" (again, could happen anytime)
9. "I do."
10. "I don't know when it happend, but at some point I started hating your fucking guts, you god-awful douchebag, you ruined my life!" (married couples only)
11. "I can't retire, I have $9.20 in the bank."
12. "What did my doctor mean by, 'Don't buy any green bananas?'"
13. "Huh?"
14. "My arm is killing me." (peaceful death)
15. "What the fu..?!?" (violent death)
My favorite is number 13, which seems to be a sort of implied, unanswered question that floats above every human being.
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