Sport is a pantomime of war, and even during peacetime, we beg its stresses back into our lives. Buying mortgages in the padded cell of Western consumer culture has turned us all into what I call horrorists. Terrorists enact violence on the lives of others; horrorists fill their own lives with ritualized violence: slasher films, roller coasters, video games, 24-hour news, sport.I threw away my television 15 years ago...too much of everything except thinking: sport pretending to be significant; advertising copy purporting to be news; lies; mind control; insanity; compelling, crappy dramas; bad acting; worse acting; and horror.
One major horror is the feeling after watching a movie/show that your anchor has come adrift - you have taken in a different way of thinking about something, and it's wrong or corrupt. A siren call, a temptation. It's like getting a worm in the ear. It's too much for the immune system to take. I don't watch TV and I am selective about films because I don't trust myself.
I stopped taking part in competitive sports about the same time. I was sailing a dinghy across a lake when a slightly larger sailing boat was approaching on a collision course. Technically he was the give-way boat, however a woman's enraged voice shouted: "Fuck off we're racing!" Although they didn't recognize me, these were people I worked with. I thought about the times that I had been in a sporting event and played really hard to win. "Not pretty," was my conclusion.
There are plenty of other things to do with my time. Some of them give me hope I can be a better person.
Does it matter whether you hate your . . . self?Robinson Jeffers
At least Love your eyes that can see, your mind that can
Hear the music...
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