metanoia's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rat Cages I must have been six or seven years old. My brother was working on his masters thesis at UCLA. It was a Saturday, he was �watching� me while my mother went shopping with a friend. He had to go to his lab, so he took me with him. I was so excited. He had a small convertible sports car. We rode to UCLA with the wind in our hair on one of those sunny L.A. days. His work involved some kind of behavioral thesis and he was using white rats. He took me in the room and said, �Don�t put your fingers in the cages, they might bite you.� There were aisles and aisles of cages stacked one upon the other to about 5 feet. And a cute little rat in each one. My brother repeated his warning and went to makes notes on his rats� progress. I wandered up and down the aisles, looking at the rats; fat rats, skinny rats, white rats, black rats, black and white spotty rats. I then stuck my finger in a rat cage. The little rat teeth pressed into the skin on my finger and broke through. It bit me! �Shit, I thought, I can�t tell my brother since he told me not to.� My finger started bleeding, and bleeding, and bleeding. It wouldn�t stop. I came to the conclusion that I was going to have to tell my brother. He was so pissed. Then he calmed down and asked me if I could remember which rat bit me. He said some of the rats there might have been injected with diseases and it was important for him to know which rat it was that way he would know if I would be ok. I said I was certain I could tell him which rat bit me. We went back into the �rat room�. I gazed at the endless cages and walked to the cage I was �sure� was the bastard rat that bit me. But, then my assuredness wavered; looking around all the rats looked alike. It was important to my brother, though, so I lied and pointed to a cage and said, �That�s the one.� �Are you sure?� he asked, looking at me doubtfully. �Yes�, I lied. He looked at the identification on the rat cage and we were relieved to find that rat was not poisonous or contagious or anything else life threatening. Of course to this day I don't believe I pointed out the right rat. LOL. I guess I'm lucky to be alive... He put a band aid on my finger and we left, all the while admonishing me going on and on about things like, �Why did you do that when I told you not to? I told you � blah blah blah, something, something�.� I relate this story because I find it interesting that I have never learned this particular lesson. I have an innate resistance to this lesson. I firmly believe I will never learn this lesson. In fact, I take a strange kind of pride in it. Really, it has served me well, keeping my life always interesting and not predictable. The only thing predictable about this whole thing is that if you want me to do something, just tell me not to do it. I will be compelled to do it. I am a prime candidate for reverse psychology; I respond to it as though it were designed perfectly and specifically for me. When I say it has served me well, it probably hasn�t. It is probably the source of many of my life crises and challenges; and still, I persist in it. It could be described as a self-destructive trait, I suppose, but I kinda like it. LOL. Go me! 8:12 p.m. - 2006-04-03 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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