Another day, another dollar

The carrot and the stick, January 2010

“LET ME GO,” he shouted. His voice echoed off the walls of his cinder block cell.

On his knees, he bent forward to gather his strength and build momentum, then he wrenched his torso backwards, hoping to force his bonds off Hulk-style.

“LET ME GO.”

Hulk-style, yes. He was that angry. His patience was gone and he wanted freedom. But his bonds did not fall away. They cinched tighter, cutting into his back with the sting of salt.

So he stopped struggling. This felt better, but the bonds did not let go. He had been bound like this for so long that his body had become accustomed to the restriction. Like the sore hip that only hurts when you run, so you don’t run. The middle aged man who rushes across the street to avoid being hit by traffic, but doesn’t actually run because he’s forgotten how and even if he remembered, his hip wouldn’t let him.

“Why won’t you let me go?” he asked. He didn’t know who he was talking to. God. The universe. Satan. Buddha. Himself. No one.

“I am not holding you,” came an answer like smoke at dusk.

It was voice-of-God style: I must be talking to God, he decided.

“Who is holding me?” This was the only question he could ask. It shouldn’t need asking really. Why is God wasting my time?

“Nothing holds you but yourself,” replied the voice, a rumbling sub-woofer sitting on a shelf of porcelain Madonnas.

“I don’t understand,” he said. He really didn’t, but oh damn, did he want to. He felt like he did when he was 8 and his parents told him that they were going to live in separate houses but they were still going to be a family.

There was no reply.

“Uh, God? Are you still there?”

Still, no answer.

“Buddha? Universe? Anyone? I don’t understand what you just said.”

Nothing.

“I don’t understand.”

More silence. Minutes pass. Seconds. It was time for a tantrum.

“I DON’T UNDERSTAND. 
I don’t understand. 
I don’t understand. 
I don’t understand. 
I don’t understand. 
I don’t understand. 
I don’t understand.”

Finally he whispered, “I don’t understand.”

His ignorance was as unyielding as his bonds. It was time to lay down. Slowly he stood, leaning against the wall for support. His knees ached and his feet tingled as if they were being stabbed by a thousand needles.

As the circulation returned to his legs, he stepped carefully over to his mat and lowered himself down. He still felt the ropes stinging into is flesh and he didn’t want to fall again.

On his mat he stretched out his legs. He was a corpse waiting for someone to discover him so he could be put to rest. He listened to the sound of his breathing. It was steady and slow. Reassuring. Like the impossibly loud grandfather clock at his uncle’s house that he only noticed deep in the night on weekend sleepovers. In. Out. Tick. Tock.

“Another day, another dollar,” he sighed as he softened into sleep.

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