Monday 4 July 2016

All the King's Men

I always wondered what falling looked like, till the day I fell off a tree. By jolly it was a huge tree and so it produced a huge fall. Falling is synonymous with climbing. Your consciousness isn't suspended. You’re well aware you’re falling. You remember everything you thought you’d forgotten, the colour of the cookie you just threw away, the taste of those hateful salads you now miss, and the stench of your excreta. You’ll remember your assignment lying at home and the leery eyes of the stupid bus driver. Forget the movies. You don’t get to shout when you’re falling. You’ll likely be too stunned, too busy wishing you’d run into Gecko the mad dog and he’d chased your life out of you, wishing for anything other than this slow, stupid and rapid fall. You get to shout towards the end of the fall though, but it won’t be Hollywood style. You’ll just scream like you were a chicken caught pants down, peeing.
Broken bones are easy to mend. That’s not to say orthopaedics is a piece of cake. You just compare it with what it’ll take to mend a broken spirit and you’ll understand why some risks can’t be insured. I’ve been there, both places, and I know what I’m saying. A needle to the buttocks is hell; now try getting a needle to your spirit. A broken spirit; who can bear? Call 911?
All the king's men helped with my bones. Then they wondered why they failed, I knew. It was because they couldn’t reach my insides. No matter how much help they offered with my stitching,  I’d never climb trees again. And that meant I’d never live in a tree house, never have a gang to hang out with in a secret hideout. Don't ever trust king's men. This isn't about spite but all they offer most times is paint and a lot of makeup.
When people fall, the first question they ask themselves is what they were doing climbing in the first place. That's not a very smart question. Then they wonder why they didn't play safe and take the easy way down. That's also not smart wondering. Its not about the fall. It's about afterwards. Questions should be about afterwards.
Isn’t that why the caged bird sings? Free spirits come in different packs. Some come in broken packs, others don't. That's why it's not really about the pack. Prisons are funny. They’re very much like celebrities. They don’t exist until you acknowledge them. I followed a squirrel up a tree today.

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