Weapons of Class Destruction

So, a while ago (actually, the day my sister's laptop crashed, which is why it's taken me this long to write about it), I was actually curious enough to see if fear of sunken ships, an actual paralyzing fear I have, had a formal name. So I Googled 'fear of sunken ships phobia' and read through the results. The first thing that struck me was how many there were. Seriously, I'm treated as such an oddity for it, I would never have guessed that there was one other person who understood exactly how I felt let alone, like, twenty! I mean, it's still a tiny little minority, but still! And from what they were expressing, it was the exact same fear I possessed.

My second thought was how they should all get together and talk with each other because they were all posting on these disparate message boards, most about phobias, and the responses they got were less than sensitive and I got the very strong feeling that they, like me, felt they were alone in the world.

And the arguments against them sometimes made me roll my eyes and sometimes made me snort with laughter, my favorite being the guy who said there's no name for it because people are only scared of drowning not the actual boats at all! This seemed like sound logic to him as he dared, "If they found a way to raise the Titanic and refurbish it so tourists could walk on it, you would do it. Of course you would! Anyone would!" Oh, hell no! I told my sister, if I were even in the same state that that happened, I'd probably pass out from a panic attack. Lessening this ass' argument was the fact that someone pointed out that there's a name for the fear of looking up at tall buildings, and if that isn't about falling off the top of it, wouldn't it stand to reason that people then are scared of the building itself and not just the possible horrible outcomes of worst case scenarios?

I learned there was a fear of open sea, and fear of large objects in the water (which I suppose comes closest to what I experience). Someone observed not incorrectly that it's natural to be afraid of sunken ships because they're like underwater haunted houses, but it goes deeper and more strongly than that. I can look at a picture of a haunted house; I can't look at a picture of the Titanic, it terrifies me too much.

I myself have tried to analyze my own fear, figure it out, but to no avail, leaving me with the impression that it's just one of those totally irrational things. Yes, the darkness that surrounds it has to do with it, yes the decay of the actual ship has to do with it as does the loss of lives on any given wreck. But that primal terror I feel when faced with just a photograph goes far beyond any of that.

I was so embarrassed by the fear, I didn't mention it for a long while. Because I was also interested in wrecks (hey, sometimes we're fascinated by what terrifies us the most) my mom got me Bob Ballard's book of Titanic wreck photos; I was actually able to leaf through it, almost daring myself not to be afraid. The breaking point came when my parents bought me Little Mermaids sheets (give me a break, I was 12!) and they had the image of that nasty sunken ship Ariel has the chase with the shark in printed all over 'em. I finally told my mom, I said, "I can't sleep on these, I'm sorry." There were questions which made me feel abnormal, I even approached the sheets time and again, trying to touch the image, to get myself used to it. I couldn't.

And that opened the flood gates, apparently, because I could not longer even have the titanic book in my room anymore, the sight of its spine sent me into fits of panic, the cover still haunts my memories. I had horrendous nightmares, I still to this day do though not like I used to, on a nightly basis.

I've gotten a bit better: we were in a museum near Williamsburg and the guide told us she was going to show us the new room. I didn't give it much thought until we were walking down a sloping ramp. They've had a lot of historic shipwrecks on the east coast and especially in that area and the entire room was dedicated to it, a U-shape with a recreation of the wreck site in the middle, the walls covered in giant color photos of the excavation. I got through it hoping to exit at the other end only to find the other side of the U a dead end. I had to go back. I did and I sat on a bench chocking down my panic as I waited for my friends. I think I would have passed out if I hadn't kept myself so much in check (and, it must be said, there wasn't much left of the wreck site because it had been a wooden ship; I cannot guarantee the same results if it had been, say, the Titanic). But I did and am proud of myself to this day.

All this only means that I'm learning to live with this debilitating fear, not "getting over it." But that's something, right?

Oh, and to the poor woman who admitted to be frightened of shipwrecks and whales: I understand perfectly, don't listen to those other fuckwads! I watched Pinocchio just yesterday with my sister, and Monstro is perhaps the most frightening thing put to film, drawn or not; it dogged my nightmares as a child.

And like these people don't have secret little fears, psh! Just a reminder to cast not the first stone, my lovelies!

Peace, Ghani

So, it's been a whole week since I saw Spidey 3 and I still can't get enough coherent thoughts to post about it on my journal. It was just so amazingly overwhelming; I know my sister and I just walked out of the theater almost in shock. She kept asking me, Did you like it, did you like it? And all I could do was nod dumbly. A day later I realized that, yeah, I LOVED it, but there was just something so...overwhelming (yes, that word again) about it. Raimi made some bold and bizarre choice, which is why I adores him; whether they were successful or not is a matter of debate, but I wouldn't want him to be doing anything else. It was certainly the most Raimi-ish of all three of the movies (I'm a die-hard Raimi fan first, so I loved that about it) and yay to Bruce Campbell in my favorite of all of his Spidey roles! Hopefully more thoughts will be forthcoming.

And, yays for jadeblood! I've no got myself my very own personal Madmartigan/Sorsha header! ♥ ! My jounral's gone all Lucas this month, with a Willow header and my prequel mood theme, because it's that time! The thirtieth anniversary of Star Wars is at hand (which coincidentally means mine is not far behind!) Well, Willow's a strech, but it is its twentieth anniversary next year! Erm, not like anyone'll remember 'cept me, but still! *Looks at the Madmartigan/Sorsha goodness and sighs dreamily*

28 Weeks Later comes out today. Looks so-so-ish. Don't understand why Robert Carlyle has been kinda type-cast as somebody's dad. I mean, obviously not in things like Eragon, where he's still type-cast as the psychopath (not that I'm complaining, mind!), but in normal-type roles. And of teenaged kids. Bleh. Throw them out to the zombies, I'll stay inside and make sweet, sweet love to Robert and call it my own personal post-apocolyptic utopia! *G*

And yes, they are zombies. You have to understand, I'm a purist. The George Romero shuffle is one of the scariest things I've seen put to films, and his movies are pure genius. But things change and evolve, in pop culture, but in culture in general as well. There are still those who complain that Romero's zombies aren't like "the real thing", i.e. voodoo-like. It's time to realize that new ideas take shape and influence the future. I might not be a fan of the fast zombie in general (c'mon! In things like the Dawn of the Dead remake, it's just plain reidiculous! They've been rotting for months! How the hell can they move that fast without bits falling off? And, hello, atrophy! That's just silly!) but 28 Days Later made its own mythos, it explained it in an unusual, convincing and frightening way. It reinvented the zombie movie.

Now others seem to be stuck between Boyle's vision and the tried and true Romero version, without allowing themselves to explore it in any unique way. Dawn of the dead was a rehash and, much as I loathe self-referential horror--because much as I love it Scream really ruined horror by blowing the whistle on its conventions--stretching to believe that the characters didn't even know that the bite is what changes people was a bit too much. And, you know, even Night of the Living Dead offered an explanation, albeit an extremely dated one about space satellites (though its message of racism will never be outdated!) Dawn of the dead--are we supposed to believe what we hear on the tv?! Hell's overflowing because of gay rights and the like? And people think this movie's radical in any good way?!

And, wow, that turned into an anti-Dawn of the Dead remake rant! I just don't get that movie. Great actors, but even the shock factor isn't high enough to make it memorable for me. Probably won't see 28 Weeks Later in the theater, and I should mention that the last third of the original 28 Days Later sucks ass big time, despite the presence of Chris Eccleston. (Yes, put those strong female characters in their place, threaten to gang bang them! That serves you right for being so independant at the beginning of the movie! Now simper girl, simper!)

Finally, check out this link: DibbukBox.Com. I remember when the original listing was on eBay; sheadog introduced me to it. Weird. The first story's creepy, the second anticlimatic, the third kinda offensive. I'm using a lot of it as the basis for a Supernatural fanfic I've started though.

Peace, Ghani