Life is a tight rope
Uploaded by punkonator on Nov 25, 2002
“What does the word life really mean to you?” Mr. Davis, my guidance counselor, asked me as I sat fidgeting in the uncomfortable chair beside his faux wood desk. “What do you mean by life?” I responded even though I was quite conscious that it’s illegal to answer a question with a question in literary law. “C’mon Brandon, I know you’re deeper than that, what do you think the meaning of life is? Why are you here on Earth? What are you going to do with yourself?” he immediately spat at me as if he’d been holding it in the whole time I was in there. “What’s life to me?” I asked myself without revealing my thoughts to Mr. Davis’ suspecting eyes. “Life is a tightrope,” I answered and continued,”…you can choose to walk and take the risk of falling into despair and depression or you can just sit down on the platform and watch the dust settle on a life you could’ve had.” “Wow, that was deep,” I said to myself as I congratulated my uncanny ability to invent meaningful answers to the most trying situations. “Could you explain yourself?” It was more of an order than a question but I disregarded the thought quickly and then proceeded in telling him about my newborn philosophy.
I told him everything. I told him how my mom and I used to fight everyday and that’s why I loved going to school so much- I could get away from the pain and sorrow. I shared all the meaningful experiences I had been acquainted with thus far in my life, like my first regatta when my boat took first place. I told him about the time we were vacationing in Sunriver, Oregon playing with my friends and a couple other guys we’d just met there at a rope swing along the Deschutes River. We were having a blast. There was nothing like jumping off the rock and being swung out twenty feet and then right at the exact moment, when you felt that your own momentum couldn’t take you any further or higher, you’d let go and fall for what seemed like an eternity, into the brisk current of the mighty Deschutes. The fun we were having was multiplied ten fold when one of the guys we’d just met hit the tree that the rope was tied to and fell into the water. We...