August 24, 2010

Cracking Open the Omniverse

By In Photography, Thoughts

Today I experienced a cranial disaster resulting from a singularity in all space and time.  It all started way back when my parents decided not to have any more children after the birth of my older sister Sarah.  Sixteen months later, I was a newborn being carried around the hospital by my father showing me off to the nurses.  Growing up, I was mothered by two sisters and my mom and through the course of events, I never really acquired that drive to be 100% responsible for my own personal well-being.  With work and with others, I’m very responsible and will do everything I can to help.  I just have a hard time helping myself with the simple maintenance of life.  Now, living alone in an apartment, I usually purchase toilet paper the day I run out of the last roll, I flip my mattress when I develop back pain and I cook when all other fast food options seem nauseating to me.  Along those lines, I’ve recently run out of disposable contacts.  The left one, my dominant eye, has a two week old contact in it and my right one is about six weeks old.  Both feel rotten and the veins in my eyes resemble someone infected with the Rage Virus.  So in order to avoid being quarantined by the military Outbreak-style, I wore my glasses today.  I hate wearing my glasses for a few reasons.  Got made fun of while growing up for having 80’s Aviator style frames and feathered hair, didn’t like having them smashed against my face by Tommy King while playing football in the park, have no peripheral vision and little depth perception and they just aren’t comfortable.  Driving to work is like driving with a diving mask on; I’m just not used to turning my head this much.

Speaking of work, people have been complaining about the parking garage.  It’s one of the main complaints of patients, visitors and new employees.  The problem is, those complaints have been fed up the ladder as “general complaints about the parking garage”.  I’ve found that the main issue is that there aren’t any clear signs about where to turn and who should yield.  So people circle around repeatedly lost like trying to escape an MC Escher drawing.  During my first few weeks of employment here, I was walking outside and a little old lady stopped her car, ran out of the garage and begged me for help getting her car out of the garage.  She was desperate and looked as if she was ready to abandon her vehicle.  But because these complaints were generalized and not specific, the action taken by the administration was that all employees have to park on the upper floors and to the South to make room for additional parking for customers.  They call it, “Park South to Drive Loyalty North,” but the loyalty they are talking about is customer loyalty not employee loyalty because now it’s impossible to find employee parking anywhere except on the fifth floor with the construction workers.  And with two to three shoots a day requiring me to go up and down the garage six to eight times a day, you start to get a little dizzy with the contant spinning and spinning and spinning…

My father is often trying to introduce the family to new products from the grocery story in order to improve our lives just a little bit.  So this past Sunday when I went to visit, instead of plain old water, I was drinking Wild Berry Aquafina FlavorSplash water.  It was delicious!  Even the next day, during my nervous vision-narrowed drive into work, the water was still good having sat in the cup holder overnight.  The water was so good that after I parked on the fifth floor, I started to read the ingredients as I walked inside to see what else was in it besides water and deliciousness.  Phosphorous?  White Phosphorous is a chemical weapon that burns people to death in war zones.  Sucralose?  Isn’t that like saying Sugarsugar?  WT…(CRACK!)  That’s when I slammed the side of my head into something metal.  I reeled back and and saw a ladder strapped to the roof of a contractor’s vehicle.  I walked right into it causing unknown amounts of laughter among the security guards watching on camera down in the basement.

It was like a singularity in the universe.  Think of everything that had to come together in order for that ladder’s aluminum and plastic and my bone and skin and blood to make contact.  I settled on these black plastic frames because nothing else looked even remotely attractive in the store, and it is like the design was specifically made to hide that ladder.  The only reason I was wearing them was because I’m too lazy to make an eye appointment sooner.  Think of all of those misdirected complaints by patients which forced me to park by the construction contractors on the top floor.  And consider that this specific contractor didn’t need his ladder today so he just left it strapped to the roof of his little wuss mini-truck that he had to buy instead of the lifted Ford F350 he really wanted but couldn’t afford because his business is underpaid by cheapskate clients.

With that much fate working against, me, it’s a wonder I wasn’t killed.  Had I looked up and avoided the ladder, all of existence could have been torn asunder.

Written by Jon Hillenbrand

Jon Hillenbrand is a Chicago-based artist working in photography and filmmaking. He has over 15 years of professional award-winning experience working both locally and nationally in television, print and web advertising. He currently calls Evanston, IL home.
1 Comment
  1. Bethany Pegues August 25, 2010

    I hope your head (and senses) survive the crash. Obviously, your capacity to think deeply is still intact. 🙂 Great blog!

    We females naturally tend to over-nurture the males in our lives – and then we complain bitterly about the men we date who have been babied by their moms and sisters. The cuter the male child, the more females do for him. I have a grown son. He was shocked when Sis and I stopped babying him. He thought we would resume at any time, so he just waited for us to come to our senses. It didn’t happen, and now he’s maturing quite nicely. LOL!