Technique #3 – Uncoiler
Definition: a releaser of tension
Story
“I don’t do well
with snakes and I can’t dance.”
Robin Williams,
comedian
I’m not afraid of
heights, I just really respect them.
That’s why I stay away from the edge!
James Hauenstein,
Goodreads author
or,
“I’m not afraid of
heights, but the idea of falling from them, well, that I’m afraid of.”
Laurell K.
Hamilton, Cerulean Sins author
Coiling can be a reliable warning of bad things to come. As can be too easily verified, desert rattlers coil before they strike.* Coiling clouds present a similar warning! I learned that while camping in upper New York State. A tornado lifted a boat from a nearby lake and nearly deposited it on what was left of our campground destination. Tornadoes combine my fear of moving very fast, together with my fear of heights. Naturalists learn nature’s warning coils.
So what is the solution to a threatening snake or tornado? With human interactions, we do a lot of fight or flight, but what about a third way – untighten, or uncoil as it is called in Senland, a landscape full of coiled snakes.
To uncoil, you have to first notice the coil, and many go unnoticed. I imagine some “former” naturalists did not! Result is a strike or a fall. Strike – failing to notice my bosses folded arms at our weekly staff meeting when I pattern her skill at ignoring her boss’s directives. Fall – having the overconfidence to claim that I fully knew the directions to the campsite, only to drive my wife and two kids into the next state – a fall and increased are-we-there-yet torture, although in this case a good thing, considering the tornado that hit the campsite during our delay!
I started this post with quotes by comedians because comedians are genies that release pent up tensions. They are expert uncoilers of societal or personal tensions. As a wit (theentertainingelf.com) said, “Handle every stressful situation like a dog. If you can’t eat it or play with it, just pee on it and walk away.” Or, I might add, do as the wit did, uncoil.
Here is one of my uncoilings:
I was clothes-lined while diving my motorcycle and, after flipping backwards ass over head, landing on my butt and checking to confirm that my head was still attached, asked a horrified onlooker whether she would like a ride. I’ll never know whether she appreciated my uncoiler. She declined and walked away … quickly. Onlookers are often smarter than motorcycle riders.
Please share your uncoiler story, humorous or not!
Did you make up any technique of your own? Share it!
*Author’s corollary: Snakes don’t have to coil to strike, as I was about to discover before my wife halted me from sitting on a lounging copperhead snake warming itself on a boulder along a hiking path in Maryland.