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I was watching an action movie from the 1980s the other day, and some people got stuck in quicksand and I thought, “Geez, quicksand was in like 40 percent of all movies in the 80s. What happened? Where is all the quicksand these days?!?!”
So I actually looked it up, and it turns out at one point quicksand may have actually been in 3 percent of all movies, and most scientists say it’s usually ridiculously portrayed. It’s not possible to drown in quicksand like we see in movies.
But it is possible to get stuck in quicksand and panic and not be able to get out for awhile. I noticed on the Wikipedia page that the faster you flail around, the more you sink. If you are calm and methodical, it’s apparently pretty easy to pull yourself out.
I am writing about this on a sobriety newsletter because I got sucked into some really bad self-pity recently, and I definitely panicked and kicked around a lot and found myself sinking deeper and deeper into it.
Just to clarify what I am talking about when it comes to self-pity: It’s the times when I am thinking, “Why me? Why me? Why?” and I often catch myself telling at least five people how tough I’ve had it. I had an ugly bout of it the other day when I had to drive my kids all around from 3:15 pm on a Friday afternoon until 10 pm that night. Just shuttling from one place to another, back home, then to another place. It was a bonkers amount of driving up and down the same streets, hustling from one activity to another, and it would have tired anybody out.
So I ended up getting more and more aggravated, telling myself a story about how tough I’ve had it, thinking about all the stuff I wanted or needed to do instead and how I should be dad of the year after all this b******t of being, you know, A DAD. I did end up letting each kid know what a brutal afternoon I had had of chauffeuring. I can laugh about it now but it was pretty dopey, and it was like quicksand. I got myself whipped into a frenzy and it was very hard to pull out.
I did find a way to get to a meeting quick during that stretch, and that just let the air out of all of that self-pity. There was somebody at a 12-step meeting for the first time in her life, and you could see the emotion of finally seeking help and saying her name out loud and saying she is an alcoholic. I mean, how can you feel sorry for yourself for being a sober Uber dad when you see both pain and hope in a moment like that?
So my solution when I get into that self-pity place is to not kick my feet and not make it worse. I can’t. It will swallow me up. I’ve had days where something I don’t like happens, and I call two or three people I know will listen and jump in the quick sand with me, and that just extends my stay. I need to do the opposite and I’m going to continue to try to do that.
But back to my original question…. how do we get more quicksand in movies? I miss it!
This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:
A drunk dies. He had $20,000 in savings. After his wife pays all the costs of burial, she tells her closest friend that there is no money left.
The friend says, "How can that be? You told me he had $20,000 a few days before he died. How could you be broke?"
The widow says, "Well, the funeral cost $6,500. Then, I spent $500 in a donation to the church and to pay the organist. I spent another $500 on the food and drinks for the wake. The rest of the money paid for the memorial stone."
The friend says, "$12,500 for the memorial stone? My goodness, how big is it?"
The widow replies, "Three carats!"
(Credit: AA Grapevine, November 2004, from Richard M. of Golden, Colorado)
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