original by Jason LaBranch (March 19, 1998)
I was futzing around last night thinking about what I could post today, and I came across one of my journals. I opened it to an interesting day. The entry is from November 1988; I was twenty. I lived on 86th street in Manhattan and would ride the number 1 down to 4th st., Greenwich Village, NYU. I rode down early in the morning during rush hour when the subway was packed with suites, and came back late at night when all the drunks were passed out in the seats; alcohol sticky on the floor. Anyone who has had the privilege of riding the NY subway everyday knows that look -- the stern look -- on everyone's face; no one talks. As the movement of the subway rocks them back and forth, they stare blankly through each other, or, at the hemeroidal cream billboards above, or, bury their face in the New York Times. When the regular bum came through with open sours and cracked fingers you would shift oh-so-slightly to avoid their eye contact or touch.
You have the context, here is a slightly modified, because of poor grammer and spelling, excerpt from my journal.
~
When I woke up this morning I decided to try an experiment. In my mind I would make my best effort to give everyone I saw my best wishes. Upon entering the subway the first person I saw had a face full of pussy red pimples. "Yuch!" I thought, forgetting my resolve -- then I remembered. "May you recognize the true beauty within your self. May you love yourself always and good fortune follow you everywhere." Suddenly I felt a shift. My angle of sight changed. It was like standing on one side of the room then suddenly being on the other. I felt my stern subway face soften. It effected me, not her.
As I continued, in my mind, to wish people good days and happy lives I began to see something strange -- very strange. I began to see peoples misery, not their goodness, like I thought I would. The weight and burdens of the world was in everyone. None looked light. Their eyes were dull, the skin was different hues of toxic shades. Before I had just looked at people and saw them as people, not too ugly, not too beautiful, some were more one than the other, but, just people. Today they were ugly, ugly, ugly. I saw that their true beauty was hidden in a veil of fear. Fear, mans worst enemy. Everything that makes a person suffer is contained within fear; fear of the future, fear of the past, fear of what people think, fear of exposing yourself, fear of love, fear of being real, fear of everything. Every movement, every action, every reaction is tainted with fear. At the same time I saw that behind the ugliness was beauty and greatness just waiting to be exposed, let free, when the shell of fear is broken.
~
Post note: This fear that I was talking about is not the "Just Do It," or the "No Fear," fear. Those are images and when you buy into those slogans you become affraid to be anything else; affraid to be yourself. You can not conquer this fear by bungy jumping, or doing crazy things, alone.