The Quest (Displacement Story)

 

The 4:00am alarm sounded and awakened Nate from a semi-sleepy state of mind.  Wrapped in sheets he brought from home he begins his day completely out of the ordinary from his usual routine.  Normally, his day would begin with a hearty breakfast of twelve egg whites, one cup of oatmeal along with eight total ounces of water and a protein shake.  His morning routine would not be complete without consuming every bite of his breakfast in order for him to perform his religiously verbatim weight lifting program.  After consuming his breakfast he would normally head off to the bathroom where he would inject himself with human growth hormone and testosterone, all better known as steroids.  Being the biggest, strongest, most handsome man in the gym was without a doubt who he was!  Nate Walker was "diced and ripped".
                                                                                                                                                                                             

Today is the competition for Mr. Olympia, one of the most prestigious body building championships in the world.  Nate has spent his entire life preparing for this day.  He is the youngest man to ever compete for the title of Mr. Olympia.  Body building has been the only thing that mattered in his life, and everything he did in his life revolved around it.  He was on a hunt for the ultimate title of Mr. "O". For him, pursuing physical perfection had become a fixation.  He had become so infatuated with himself that he had lost track of just how many steroids he was actually taking and what they were doing to his health and well being.  

As he prepares for the day, Nate thinks back on the past few years and the sacrifices he has made to attain the image he so desires.  There have been many painful moments both psychologically, physically and emotionally.  While other young men have pursued careers and relationships, he has had only one single-minded goal, the title of Mr. Olympia.  Shutting out people had become second nature to him, not even the beautiful young women who longed for just a slight noticeable glimpse from his eyes at the gym where he trained so vigorously.  Other men would even drop their weights to watch him.  His presence was so arousing that it created distractions in the gym unparallelled to any other person.  It was as if time itself was paralyzed as he would begin his daily workout routine.

 

 

The time had come, the day he had been preparing for for so long, had finally arrived.  His body had been completely shaven and waxed clean.  The night before, he had his appointment with the Sun Gods where they sprayed every nook and cranny of his naked flesh with dark tanning spray so that every muscle striation and vein shone like gleaming bronze under the lights of the auditorium.  The white sheets he had wrapped himself in were brown from the excess spray and he wadded them up and put them in a large black trash bag to be thrown away.  Totally focused, Nate dresses himself in his comfortable Nike sweat pants and zip up hoody, and heads to the auditorium only a block away from his hotel room.  Entering through the back stage he can hear the music and the announcer's sound checks.  Only two hours left to go before he steps on stage.  

                                                                                                                                                                                           

Unknowingly, in the shadows he was being watched.  People were everywhere and there were conversations occurring simultaneously all around him, and many of them "about" him.  One particular young lady had been following his progress over the years and was there as a competitor herself.  In fact, it was because of him that she had spent the last year perfecting her own skills and body for the Figure Class.  She had witnessed the discipline which he displayed and he had unknowingly been the greatest influence in her decision to finally begin competing.  Emma spoke of him as if they were close friends when actually they had never even spoken a word to each other face to face.  Emma had decided that today was the day that she was going to finally reveal her love for him.  She thought Nate was drop dead beautiful, but she really had no idea who he was on the inside.


Feeling all alone as she walked across the stage in front of the judges, all Emma could think of was Nate. As she stepped foot on stage, feeling the adrenalin flowing through her veins, Emma knew she was beautiful in her purple bikini covered in hundreds of rhinestones that glittered in the light, showing her perfectly beautiful long legs and shapely fit body, her long auburn hair hanging in soft ringlets down her back to her waist.  If only Nate were there watching, noticing her, but he was not.  When the judges called the top five in her class, Emma sadly placed fifth.  Walking across the wooden floor of the stage, Emma felt more alone than ever.  The show is now over for Emma, but not for Nate.  Much to the disbelief of many, Nate wins the title of Mr. Olympia and sets a world record for his age.  When the show was over, Emma approached Nate backstage with a hopeful heart only to be completely ignored and rejected.  In fact, her presence wasn't even acknowledged with his body language. Emma then slips silently away into the night with nothing more than a faded memory and a shiny crumpled pink ribbon that showed her Fifth Place. 

 

As Nate returns to his upscale hotel in downtown L.A. he enters his room and turns to the mirror over the lavatory.  He stares at the man staring back at him in the mirror and he is pleased with his accomplishments. He fills the sink with lukewarm water, leans over and scoops the water into his hands and splashes his face.  Then he backs up and looks at himself again in the mirror.  He had really done it.  Now the whole world knows that Nate Walker is Mr. Olympia.  No man ever as young as he is has won this title.  He steps back, admiring his physique, a smirky smile on his face, when suddenly without warning he grabs his chest and falls with a loud crash to the floor.  Nate Walker is dead. 

Symbols and Signs

Nobokov really sets the stage, doesn't he? I couldn't agree more with Autumn, this story is sad, but yet beautiful. During my experience of reading this story, I couldn't help but notice signs and symbols throughout the article. The signs and symbols are there, whether we choose to acknowledge them or not is an entirely different story. Nobokov does an excellent job of capturing what LIFE really is. This story says it all. Life has a way of profoundly projecting signs and symbols throughout our entire lifetime from the time we are born until we die. We don't always notice them and many times we miss some very important and meaningful opportunities because we aren't aware of them. While looking into the heart of the story, it is not just about life, but death, love and sadness, sickness and health. It's the tiny little things like the bird twitching in the puddle of water symbolizing the loss of youth or death of the son; the swollen veins in the husbands hands showing his age; the sons desire to want to fly and his inability to live in reality; and of course the jelly jars which to the boy could represent many things......... My favorite part of the story, that even brought a tear to my own eyes was this part. "During the long ride to the subway station, she and her husband did not exchange a word, and every time she glanced at his old hands, clasped and twitching upon the handle of his umbrella, and saw their swollen veins and brown-spotted skin, she felt the mounting pressure of tears." So sad, but so sweet. These are signs of the END, and the BEGINNING. The husband had what we call a GUT feeling about his son, but really it was intuition, which is inside all of us. The story is full of many different emotions and although it seems negative, really it isn't. Naturally, as humans, most people who will read this story will feel sad, blue, gloomy, heartsick emotions. All the boy wanted was a chance to fly but in his trapped mind it was impossible. All the parents wanted was a chance to embrace their son and show him their love. In the boy's mind suicide seemed like the way to go and he might be able to fly in his afterlife. To him, flight may have represented freedom from the thoughts he was so possessed with that constantly kept his mind captive. They don't call your mind, your psyche, the seat of your soul for nothing. Does this story move me? Yes it does. It's unequivocally beautifully sad, but I loved every bit of it.

The Spinners

 

In some ways it's difficult to tell where "reality" ends and the tapestry begins as they are both telling the same story. What is real is interacting with what is unreal.....sort of all woven together just like story of the spinners. It is as if the tapestry is interacting with the women and vice versa. The entire painting is the weaving together of reality and mythology, mortal human and goddess, truth and fiction, darkness and light, rich and poor, young and old, filth and cleanliness, good and evil, friends and enemies, power and service.......etc., etc., etc. The cat is extremely fascinating as well. She has her right ear turned out as if listening to the goddess Athena while facing Arachne. Cat's are ALWAYS curious. She also has her eye on the ball of wool, ready to pounce and unwind it (wound and unwound!). After reading the story, I learned that Arachne's punishment from Athena for challening her was that Athena turned her into a spider where she would have to weave for the rest of her life. In the painting, as Arachne is holding the wool in her left hand there appears to be a vague outline of a spider web hanging underneath the wool, kind of a foreshadowing of what is to come in the future for her.

 

INITIATION FROM THE INSIDE

Initiation is a term as defined in Frank and Wagner as a start or beginning of something new. Initiation can be into a club, futurity, sorrority, band, or group such as the Klu Klux Klan. It can be demeaning, humiliating, painful and harmful.  It's become a common practice in The South and has been especially made known in recent years how even band members must go through initiation that can be life threatening.

 

 

THE PHENOMENA OF INITIATION

 

From the times of the first Olympic games when athletes had to run naked and the times of Socrates to this present day, and scandals on fraternity, sorority and band ceremonies has cost lives. Nothing has really changed. When the human decides the procedure it is often cruel, demeaning, ridiculous and worse.

 

SO WHAT'S THE PURPOSE?

 

To put others under the pressure to reach the level where they are and their supreme status. It has cost lives......many lives! So what is initiation really? Initiation is the start of something new, reaching towards the unknown with hope and wanting to fit in. Initiation in it's purest concept is simply just starting something new in your life and discovering a lifestyle that's fitting.

Only your peers can inflict punishment on you/their own peers, in order to reach a level of false servitude and pledge obedience where no obedience is required except in their social structure. Many deaths of young people have ocurred just simply trying to join their peer group. And the power and the money always controlled it along with "society"!

 

Initiation is the start of something new in your life regardless of age - the start of something you've never seen before. You hope for the best...... In reality it's suckling your mother's breast. There you got your first introduction to sustenance and life! There as you clasped to your mother's breast you found security, love, balance and reward. This was your FIRST initiation into this world! And each child, whether newborn, 20, 30 or 40, needs to realize their first introductions were not wrong and sustenance came from it and these values will carry you for the rest of your life.

 

SO WHAT GOES WRONG?

 

From birth you knew what real initiation was - it was loving and it was kind. As time goes on the rules seem to change in mid stream and you no longer need to suckle a breast. You're trying to grow - giving everything you have. You're scared, you're loving but you're fearful. So what happens? You went from your mothers' arms to school, into the world, and you found the hatred, the biases, that you never found at your mother's breast. Like thousands of generations of humans you were thrown in the pikes of hatred, class warfare and bigotry. Not one person in millions of years have escaped these problems! Nor ME!

 

SO WHAT'S THE ANSWER?

 

The answers are within you and only you can answer the questions as to what is real and what is not just like every human being in the course of their lives has had to do for millions of years. The process is slow and tedious and requires thought. Like the late great horsemen Ray Hunt and Tom and Bill Dorrance said - THINK! Ray, Tom and Bill believed that humans have the ability to mentally, emotionally and physically be able to psychologically meditate in a way of making connections so that every little feeling, action and choice is in accordance with timing and balance.

 

 

THINK!!!! It is up to you what initiation ultimately will be so long as you are not a victim of supposed authority based on ignorance! It is ultimately up to you to decide what is true and what is not! It is up to you to THINK - weigh the variables - to decide in your own precious life who you want to be! Thus I conclude that initiation is up to you and only you! Nobody else can do it for you. "If you find a way to fit this way of thinking right here, it will make you better. It will make you better in ways you never knew it could." (Buck Brannaman)


ARE  ALL INITIATIONS BAD ?

No they are not all bad. In fact there are many initiations that are great. This starts from the day you are born and suckling from your mothers breast, to one day being baptized. Initiations can be expressed as building a fort at 10 years old and having a secret password just to go inside, at the age of 15 becoming a boy scout or girl scout and swearing an oath, when you turn 18 pledging allegiance to the flag through the United States military, being united in marriage and saying your wedding vow to your future spouse. Taking communion at church, this is a way of showing your commitment to Christ. All through out your life you are constantly being tested with initiations. Everybody wants to fit in and pass the test. It is a right of passage, a test of character, it's human nature.