Black Mirrors: Sharks, Prince, Salt & Everything Else You've Come To Fear The Most

I’d the oddest dream last night. I was off the beaches of Fiji, dogpaddling the Pacific Ocean...when suddenly I started being chased by a troupe of singing Hammerhead sharks. It was rather disturbing. The sharks were all singing various Prince songs. A few were crooning When Doves Cry. Another belted out Let’s Go Crazy. There was even one that had committed to memory I Would Die 4 You. The weird thing was, in my dream, I didn’t think twice about why these sharks were hunting me down...or how they’d taught themselves to speak, let alone sing. No, all I could think of was, “Seriously, how do all these sharks know so many different Prince songs?!?”

Note to self: No more cheese before bed. Or Purple Rain.

While I’m relieved that singing fish are utter falsehoods...the parts concerning Fiji, the Pacific, dogpaddling, and me are utterly true. In December of ’05, I vacationed off the coast of Nadi, where I’d the luxury of swimming in an ocean for the very first time. Alas, there were no sharks involved...but I blogged about the experience nonetheless. As I read my entry for the first time in over a year, I can’t help but think of Black Mirrors:

Today, I met up with my uncle and his wife. I spent the entire afternoon with them loafing on the beach and swimming in the sea. The sea! God, I’ve never tasted saltwater before! How unfamiliar! The entire experience has caught me completely off guard.

When you least expect it, the circle of life has an amazing sense of throwing new arches your way. As conscious beings, we spend a tremendous part of our brief and limited existence arrogantly assuming we’ve seen and done it all. Using a string of singular, recurring daily rituals, we end up persuading ourselves that life is nothing more than mere routine:

• Wake up at 7:52am
• Drop kids off at school
• Commute to job
• Work eight hours
• Drive home
• Eat dinner
• 6:00pm news
• Put the kids to bed
• Watch Law & Order
• Read a couple chapters from a NY Times bestseller
• Fall asleep
• REPEAT

It’s from this mindset we make-believe that all future events in our lives, no matter how fresh and new, end up being repackaged versions of our past. You might fall in love with some fantastic new girl…but it’s not like you haven’t fallen in love before. You might graduate with your MBA…but it’s not like you haven't graduated before (high school, kindergarten, etc). Even the swank of brand new creations end up being boiled down re-inventions. The never-before-seen 2008 Ford Explorer is really just another Ford Explorer. Coke w/Lime is really just Coke...with lime. We’ve been there and done that. We’ve experienced all that life can offer.

Then one day you paddle out into the Pacific, taste some salt, and re-realize how naked and alone you truly are. It’s thrilling and humbling and dreadful...and all at once. Overwhelming, for sure. I guess it’s times like these that make air worth breathing. If there weren’t a sense of uniqueness or individuality to our experiences, what would motivate us to keep pushing forward in the first place?

As you can tell, this topic exceedingly vexes me. I’m constantly petrified that if I stay in one place for too long, it'll end up being the death of me. It’s why I changed my major three times in college. It’s why I can’t hold down a steady relationship or career for longer than a year. It’s why in the past eight years, I’ve lived in seven different cities…at fourteen different addresses…with thirty-nine different roommates. It’s why I’m always walking away.

What if there comes a moment in my life where every experience is so familiar that it all ends up being one deeply tiresome routine?

The truth is I shouldn’t be fretting over such thin-skinned uncertainties. And not because the questions are intensely heavy or depressive...but rather because the questions solely serve as a clever way of stating, What if I’ve been there and done that…and then I get bored? It plays off a primal assumption that I’ll actually get to a point in my life where I’ve done everything. And who am I to be worrying about that? I’m two weeks shy of twenty-seven years and savoring saltwater for the very first time.

The way I live, consume, and play, I’ve maybe thirty years left in me. Unless I hit the Mega Millions jackpot, I can pretty much guarantee that two-thirds of that time will be consumed by work and sleep. A good portion of that remainder – my so called “free time” – will in all likelihood be spent playing Nintendo, listening to Belle & Sebastian CDs, reading comic books, watching Mad About You reruns, and being an all-around sarcastic wiseass.

Been there, done that? If anything, I should be concentrating on being nowhere and doing nothing.