Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

off-topics

breakfast of champions

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I’m awake at 8am, just like any other day of the week.

I briefly debated if I should eat some sort of special pre-jump meal, but given my general lack of stomach for breakfast it seemed like an unnecessary temptation of fate to eat anything unusual before skydiving. I settled on my favorite meal and number one comfort food, Special K Red Berries with Silk Soy Milk.

(ps: Why is it called “Red Berries” when it only has strawberries in it? Wouldn’t you say that strawberries are the red berry with the strongest draw? Like, “OMG, I’m going to get some red berries today, I hope there’s some strawberries in there!” Did some other cereal copyright “strawberries”? Anyhow…)

I’m also a bit torn about how to style my hair and what underwear to wear – two factors that are clearly not going to have a net effect on my jumping experience

A few months ago I was yelling at my mom for not having a living will. The most dangerous thing she does is perpetuate a three-decade long smoking habit. So, jumping out of a plane made me feel like a bit of a hypocrite for not putting any affairs in order.

(PS: No one, under any circumstances, should tell my mom I am skydiving. This is one of those occasions that justifies my blocking her on Twitter. If she finds out she will hit me with the Italian fear/guilt combo so fast and hard that I won’t even let the man strap himself to my back, let alone jump off of anything with him. Anyhow…)

On the off-chance I die today, here’s all that I could think of while I was brushing my teeth:

I don’t like coffins. I want to be disposed of in a green way where the earth can just reclaim me. If that’s not readily available in Pennsylvania I’d want to be donated to science – with the caveat that they can’t dissect or otherwise alter any of my boy parts, because that is just weird.

I don’t like funerals. We went to a beautiful wake for Wes’s father last year that was full of music and might not have mentioned the “G” man even once. I really liked that.

If I get killed doing this I blame Drew’s cancer.

I didn’t get to far past that, because (a) I don’t think I’m going to die (and would like to keep it that way so, please mom, no calls), and (b) I was really hungry for that bowl of Special K.

I’m going to go take a shower now, and mull more over the hair and underwear dilemma.

no fear of flying

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In less than twelve hours I will jump out of a plane.

I’ve wanted to skydive for a long time. Forever? Since before I started having the flying dreams, I think, so frequent and tangible that the power of personal flight started to feel familiar.

The flying – the being high above the ground part – is familiar. Even the rushing quickly towards the ground part, because, honestly, sometimes I am not quite so pro at the dream-flying. It always turns out okay.

The voluntarily leaping out of a plane in midair, no so familiar.

Mildly terrifying, actually.

That’s the paradox. There’s this thing I want to do, and I know I’m going to love it because I’ve dreamt of it for years. Yet there’s the tiny problem of getting underway. One second of hard part – the difficulty of taking one step and letting gravity take its course, and then fifteen thousand feet of dream.

That first step is the only thing I’m afraid of. At the moment. And not just tomorrow. In general. I’m afraid of single steps, but obsessed with what comes after.

Just afraid of that one step.

Poll me again on that one in the morning.

Filmstar. Rock’n’Roll Star. Wife.

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Elise & Co. (aka Filmstar) rocked an amazing show tonight at the M-Room, followed by the obscenely sexy and awesome Stone Thrown (like Muse, but Philly-local and half-Asian).

Here’s Filmstar’s newest tune, which I am in love with. Note the Bowie / Karen O. dual influences.

(Or, head to YouTube to watch “Rock & Roll Star.”)

There is prelim talk of a worlds-colliding Filmstar v. Arcati Crisis party/show sometime in the fall. If that were to happen, I would play the shit out of a tambourine on that song.

Shake It Off

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Last night our Arcati Crisis rehearsal ended with me in fantastic voice and looking rather delicious.

I decided to harness those powers to record my first-ever video for CK – of the reticent original song “Shake It Off,” that has proven nearly impossible to record an audio demo of.

Behold:

More videos to come!

Escaping Mediocrity

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I am not a major reader of mommy-blogs.

Sure, I have my certain mommy favorites, as well as several long-time reads who happened to be or become moms, but I don’t typically seek out new moms to read. They’re just in a different part of their lives than I am, at the moment.

All that said, Maverick Mom is a blog worth reading. It’s not just about motherhood. Or, maybe as of a month or two ago it was. Right now it’s about motherhood (and the rest of life) as an adventure that is helping blogger and entrepreneur Sarah Robinson “escape mediocrity.”

Escaping mediocrity. Does it mean anything to you? If not, you should read her gripping post about nearly losing her son to a riptide. At the end she has the wherewithal (and good humor) to compare the riptide to the tug of mediocrity.

Sarah’s post poses a challenging question: are we accepting the average because it’s easy, eventually to discover that we’re lost with no sign of what’s good, right, or successful?

I know the first impulse is to say, “Nope!” Our lives are awesome, right? We totally love them.

Okay, sure. But, loving life doesn’t exclude the chance that you’re settling for something. Can you honestly say you don’t have anything in your life that is disappointingly average – not as challenging or fulfilling as it could be? We all know I aim to kick ass at all times, but even I can cop to pieces of my life that aren’t living up to their potential. I wage a constant war on some of them, but in all honesty I let others slip by. Easy can be nice. Status quo is even keel.

If your answer about anything is “maybe” or “yes” or “omg, definitely,” then you should start reading Sarah’s blog, perhaps beginning with the escape plan she’s hatched to push past the mediocre elements of our lives.

Sarah, you are anything but mediocre.