Mar

19

For the world is hollow and I have touched the sky…

Filed Under Babbling, Writings/Rants 

For the world is hollow and I have touched the sky…

Yesterday, I saw that as writing on a bathroom stall… I had to snap a picture because the line was so hauntingly familiar. I couldn’t make out what was underneath it. So I took a picture, and I put it on Facebook to remind me later to look for it… Plus, there’s something about intelligent bathroom graffitti that I actually enjoy.

A note on that: intelligent bathroom graffitti? Yes. I’m referring to anything other than the “[Phone Number/E-mail] for a good time,” “[Fraternity/Politician] sucks,” or the classic “I pooped here.” Every so often, like the nuggets that we let slip while we sit on that porcelain throne, we read a nugget of truth on the wall. Of course, this is coming from the guy who saw “The cake is a lie” on a bathroom stall and had no idea it was from Portal.

When I read that on the wall, it made sense, and at the same time, it felt really hauntingly familiar… I tried to rationalize what it could mean. When you think about it, the words “world” and “sky” are operative terms here. It all depends on how you take those two words. If you consider that “world” could be referring to an individual person and not the world as a world itself and that “sky” is a goal you’re reaching for, it’s as if you’re accomplishing something, fulfilling who you are and what you can be.

I think that’s where my mind first went. And then there was the direction that I started thinking religiously. I could only barely make out the “TOS 65″ underneath it, and ironically that was only after I got home. I was trying to think why that looked familiar and why it was something that seemed so simple and maybe just a quote from something else. And if it was a quote, what was it from and what meaning did it have?

When I got home and I did a google search for it, I felt stupid for not knowing it.

The quote was an episode title from Star Trek. That’s why it said “TOS 65:” The Original Series, episode 65. Well, that aside, why would you put a Star Trek episode title on a bathroom wall…

In the episode, the line refers to an ancient proverb that ties into the fact that the individuals are living inside an “arc” in space, of sorts. Just a giant asteroid/ship that’s floating around. And the line refers to being outside of this ship. Because, well, their world is hollow, and to get outside, you’re touching the real sky…

Not really too profound, till I found something else out, actually…

There’s a band from Sweden called Jeniferever that wrote and recorded a song of the same name. While I haven’t been able to find that song in particular, in sampling some of their music on MySpace, I can only imagine how it really would sound, and it makes me yearn to try to get my hands on it even more…

I read those lyrics to be longing, to be understanding… To just be living.

That truth, and knowing the real truth, sometimes just aren’t the same thing and aren’t the best thing to do. And sometimes, we just need to “smile and bear with it” because we know all we need to know. There’s a longing to the truth and how we know things and how we live things, and in that, in everything we don’t know, there’s a good reason for it…

I’m not going to try to wax philosophical anymore on this one because I think this is a phrase that we need to take what it means to us individually to each of us if we can find meaning to it…

But leave it to me to psychoanalyze a piece of wall graffitti that ends up being the title of a Star Trek episode…

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    About The Site


    Thanks for stopping by, folks! My name is Adam J. Cohen, and I'm a guitarist/songwriter in Champaign, IL, recently relocated from Orlando, FL where I'm a UCF grad. Here, you'll find vignettes on my life, setlists and show reviews, and whatever else crosses my mind. Enjoy!