Killing Joke: A Reflection

I just finished watching The Killing Joke. And this story always gets me really choked up. I had the same reaction when I read the comic years ago. And it’s the ending that gets me, the last exchange between Batman and the Joker that has me in tears.

I’m not sure why.

That might seem strange. I’ve had to think on it a bit, but having tears in my eyes at the end of that story is an unusual reaction. So I had to look inward.

It’s not the idea of ‘no one being beyond redemption.’ That’s an interesting tale, but not what I think this is about.

It’s the idea that some of us our broken inside. There is this aching, cackling, irrational lunatic screaming to pour forth that we hide from the world because there’s no place in the world for it. There are too many repercussions. We’d be judged or embarrassed or shunned or hurt again for showing that part of us.

And it might not necessarily be a murderous clown. It might be a singer, a dancer, a painter or poet or musician or chef. We might not even be good, but we just love doing it. The Joker isn’t always funny, but he keeps cracking jokes. And somewhere along the line we stuffed that liberated maniac down so deep into our psyche that we only see them in our deepest dreams and nightmares.

And then there’s Batman. The edge of that world. The darkness reins all of that crazy chaotic color back in.

But he’s also a safety net. He’s that person that always pulls the Joker back from the brink of destruction. At the end of each exhaustive rampage of lunacy, he’s there to bring the Joker home.

I think deep down, for every damaged, broken, stifled creative, we’d love to have a dark knight holding the back of our pants as we dangle over the precipice and laugh into the abyss, just to feel the rush. Just to feel alive. Just to laugh and forget everything miserable that ever happened to us. 

Just to know we can leap and survive the fall.

And Batman offers to help rehabilitate the Joker. And the Joker acknowledges that’s it too late. He’s too far gone. The dream is too far gone and there’s no hope of being unbroken again.

Perhaps we feel that same way. Perhaps we can’t ever feel that alive again, or can’t let ourselves be that free once more.

Maybe we can’t be the Joker anymore. But we can be the Dark Knight that keeps bringing that creative explosion back from the abyss, holds them until they stop shaking, and brings them home again. The world needs both.

Maybe that’s crazy. Maybe that’s more sane than anything.

A New Normal

A return to normal.

There has been a lot of talk lately about when we will be able to ‘return to normal.’ Understandably so. The wake of the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted all of our lives in various ways. And world leaders are struggling to decide on remedies to the situation, and there is much debate on when we as a society will be able to return to normal, and what that will mean when the time comes.

I’ll leave the specifics of that to other articles. My focus is slightly different. I’ll make the argument that we have no normal to return to. Our lives were not normal before this.

Waking up at 6 AM to get ready and spend an hour in traffic to work your 9 hour day (let’s be honest, its 8-5 now, not 9-5), to sit through another hour of traffic to get home exhausted at somewhere between 6 and 7 PM, depending on any errands you need to run on the way home.

If you have any secondary hobbies, activities, or children, you attempt at that until 9 PM. Then you have an hour or two to wind down, then sleep, often getting maybe 6 hours of sleep a night?

All government, utility companies and public bureaucracy are only open during those times, so you’re having to take time from work to get simple necessities done, only to have to “make up” that time later.

Conference here. Meeting there. Run here. Run there. Punch in. Punch out.

And we wonder why so many of us were anxious, depressed, upset, agitated. We felt…. Off. Something wasn’t right. This is not how we were meant to live. This constant white water was not part of nature nor the human condition. But had convinced ourselves it was “normal.”

It was not. It is not. I will admit, this is not normal either. But the bits of time we’ve gotten back. The ways we’ve been forced to reevaluate.

I would like us as a society to contemplate a return to normal. A return to mentally, physically and emotionally healthy balance of life. Where we can work enough to both survive and enjoy our lives, rather than always being under the gun on bills and work deadlines. That isn’t life. It never was.

I won’t pretend to have all the answers to this mult-faceted dilemma. But I would like to see the conversation grow. And before the bureaucrats and big business owners seek to jam society back into this unhealthy dog race once more, that we contemplate what a new normal could, or should be. Try to avoid 1 to 3 word answers. Challenge yourself to think. What could we ask for from our leadership to make our lives better? More sustainable? Healthier?

Now is the time to submit those requests, or possibly demands, as a whole. There is no better time than now. And as the pandemic eventually dies down, we could find a new normal to begin, one that benefits us as people, and not just powers that be.

What does your new normal look like?

New Time

Of all the things COVID-19 has taken from us, there's 1 very valuable thing it has given us back.

Time.

Time to spend at home. Time to reflect.

Over the past few decades, we've continuously ramped up our need to stay busier and busier. As if constant white water were the key to success. And all the 'Hustle Gurus' would keep adulating working 18 hour days and sleeping 3 hours a night.

It's given us time to reflect. To read. To talk more with one another.

Yes, we could still get lost in the endless media feed. But I would encourage everyone to take some of this downtime to enjoy some quiet (if possible with your living situation.) Sit and read together, read to each other. (If you don't have books, Google Folklore or Mythology. There's tons of free stuff.)

Play an instrument. Sing. Exercise.

This extra time we can better ourselves, enjoy time in our own skin and in our own homes.

I feel like in the bustle of this age, we have such precious little time to enjoy these things. I'm not making light of all the negative ways this is affecting people right now. But I'd like us to take this moment to, so much negative aside, be grateful for this opportunity to not be running at mach speed for a few weeks.

Any maybe after this, we might have more opportunities to enjoy a slight slowing of pace. Times of reflection, times of conversation, times of self betterment.

I think I miss a slightly slower pace. I know I'm not alone. I feel, think and believe that the constant sprinting that certain careers and lifestyles demand just aren't healthy. Mentally, physically, or emotionally.

I hope that this may shift some priorities, and perhaps even force some different business practices in the long run. That perhaps we can find and create opportunities to cultivate and enjoy the one resource we cannot renew nor increase: Time.

Djibouti

Educational Story Time with Gideon! 😁

So today I learned that Djibouti is an actual place, and not just a word to make 12 year olds snicker.

A little info on Djibouti.

Geographically speaking, there's a large canal of water that penetrates deep into Djibouti. Water traveling into Djibouti's port closes into a canal that opens up further on the inside after entry.

The History of Djibouti is quite fascinating.

It was apparently at various times in its history, under the control of the Adal and the Ifat Sultans.

So it was at various points Adal Djibouti and Ifat Djibouti.

It also at one point belonged to Sultan Umar Walashma.

So, Walashma Djibouti, we’ll continue with the story.

Apparently, after that, there was a rebellion against the Ethiopian emperor under Sultan Ali, when it was a revolting Djibouti.

In 1376, Sultan Abdul Muhammed attacked the regional Djibouti chieftain named Hadeya. So when Djibouti is in danger, be sure to Hadeya Djibouti.

In the 1800’s, Djibouti came under control of different Christian dynasties, named Yifat and Menz.

Thus that was considered the era of Yifat Menz Djibouti.

After this was the French Colonial phase, where it could be said that the French dominated Djibouti and plundered Djibouti.

After this, autonomy was achieved in 1977 through democratic process and voting, and it is now a whole and independent Djibouti.

Wins and Losses

Life doesn't happen inside a vacuum.

Small successes can feel like great victories because of what it's leading to next, or because of where we know we've come from to get there.

The same thing with losses. This is why we can break down crying over our computer not working or our car breaking down.

Because it's not that single moment that we are reacting to, but the building tension of dozens of small set backs, failures and losses that compound in our minds and souls until it feels like it's crushing us.

Every hurt. Every abandonment. Every time we're ignored or brushed aside.

This is why we sometimes behave irrationally, even to ourselves.

I read a quote recently, a paraphrase of Seneca, that said that we can find reasons for sorrow when we are looking for them, but that we can find reasons for joy as well.

I believe this to be true, although it is easier said than done.

Because every time something goes wrong, it's going to echo inside of every other time these similar things have gone wrong in our lives.

But I choose to believe that if we can find another focal point, a place to focus our energy that is forward and beyond ourselves, that we can pull up from each setback and each loss to push forward to be a better, stronger, wiser version of who we were today.

That's my thoughts on it for this morning.

May your losses be kindling for the fires of your greatness.