Rock, Hard Place

35,040 hours.

*****

This past week a movie opened in national release called "127 Hours." I haven't read the book, but I did see news on this story back when it happened, so I know ahead of time that I'm probably not strong enough to handle this film. (I might have been strong enough to handle this film before July of last year, but we'll never know.) Similar films have been difficult to handle, films like "Into the Wild" (I'm okay until the part where the animals can smell death on him and run from him) and "Touching the Void" (where I can handle it until the filmmaker puts the camera in the hands of the actor who plays Joe Simpson and has him point the lens at his face). Maybe later on in my life I'll watch "127 Hours."

"127 Hours" reminds me of a story that the Unitarian minister told in the homily last Sunday on premeditated mercy. A man who had a parrot in a cage traveled to a far-off land where the parrot had come from to ask the parrot's family if there was a message for him. When the man found the parrot's family, he asked the parrot's brother for a message, and the brother cried a single tear and then fell over dead. The man was in shock for having killed his parrot's brother inexplicably, and went home to share the story with his parrot. When he told the parrot what had happened, the parrot did the same thing as his brother--he shed a single tear and fell over dead. The owner was devastated--he took the parrot outside to bury it and laid it on the ground to dig the hole. As he did, the parrot revived and flew up in the treetops. The man looked up at the parrot and said, "I don't understand--I thought you were dead." And the parrot replied, "No. See, my brother told me that sometimes the only way you can escape the cage you're in is to die. You should die to live."

Or amputate a part of your life.

I don't know why I thought of all of that this week. No, yes I do. But it doesn't make as much sense right now as I would like it to. The first line of this post is only the beginning.

Onward.