The Northeast Blackout of 2003 brought on a warm, fuzziness deep in my soul. I wasn’t reactionary when I saw the first traffic light staring blankly at me; causing much confusion to the already stupefied drivers we have on Long Island. Not even after I noticed that, as far as I could see, all the way down Montauk Highway, all the traffic lights where dead. I was calm. It was a fair August evening so I had all the reason to be but there was something else inside me welling up like the nutrient rich waters of the Humboldt Current. It was dim out and it was daylight. There were no signs blaring at me…nothing neon or fluorescent. Nothing yelling at me to buy “fresh bagels for $1.99” or ordering me to stop at the crosswalk or force-feeding me the rainbow of corporate monster, spectrum. It was pleasant. It was chaotic. Things were falling apart. It was subtle. The very fabric of what the general masses cling to was unthreading and it was happening all at once. So why was I elated? I can remember feeling this same sort of thing when I was a kid and it started snowing the night before and the possibility of school being cancelled the next day loomed heavily in the pink skies. It was the gushy feeling that we would all be off. That we would all have to stay at home, cozy on our couches, collectively. The blackout was a bit deeper and more troublesome than a day off from school but still this same gushy feeling had come to me. It was this idea that maybe for once, we could all just be in the same boat together and collectively we would all have to restructure ourselves and what we have taken for granted would have to be reckoned with. This was changing times for me (or a short glimpse of it anyway). This was mass hysteria, the breaking down so we could rebuild and I was reveling in it, happily. I love chaos. I love revolution. More so I love that there is some chance in hell that one day it could all be taken away from us and if you ain’t ready for it you will go down…you will not survive because you are not the fittest. Holy shit!!!! You might just become aware and if you had become aware then maybe you could evolve and survivalism wouldn’t be who gets the biggest SUV or who’s television set has more clarity. It may just turn into…who can sustain life after the bomb? Who can grow their own crops? Fuel their own home? If it’s not love then it’s the bomb…Oh yes, the bomb, the bomb, the bomb, will bring us together.
I’m a believer in chaos. After all, things must fall to be risen again. We have become too accustomed. Too buddy buddy with concepts like haste and waste, fleecing, gluttony. I just want awareness and not for the sake of it but if you actually became aware you’d actually start having life changing turns in your life and good ones at that. Things could start to turn around for you and when that begins to happen then things could start to turn around for all of us. Collectively. Someone told me once I was sick for getting happy when things started to fall apart. They even made connections with said happiness to 9-11. I quickly and savagely made my retort, pained by the thought that anyone could feel happiness at such a tragedy and senseless act of cowardice. I’m not deranged enough to find pleasure in other peoples suffering and pain. That’s not what makes me happy about chaos. You see it’s that snow day thing again. It’s the idea that all of us will be off when it snows too much the roads aren’t safe to drive on. It’s that idea that when the lights go out we are all in the dark. Together*.
* I in no way endorse a Utopian society or any similar form thereof. I am merely stating that when the shit hits the fan I will be ready and smiling.
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