Beware The Calm Of Complacency That Attacks Us During Summer Terrorism Time
by
Cliff McKenzie, Editor
vigilancevoice.com

GROUND ZERO PLUS 1355 DAY--New York, NY, Saturday, May 29, 2005--I'm like everyone else in America. The last thing I want to think about this summer is Terrorism.

The sun is shining. The waves slap against the beaches, singing the siren song to those of us who love to soak up the rays of summer and think about BBQ's and soft breezes shoving the sounds of jazz jammers gently past our ears as we sip a Starbucks under the starlit sky above Washington Square Park.

Summer brings its glory but also nightmares

Who wants to think of some Terrorist looming in the shadows, fixing the wires on his or her suicide bomb? Who wants to worry about the cell down the street of angry young people plotting where the next example of Terror power can best be ignited to drive the infidels into their captialistic shells?

Certainly, I don't. My children and grandchildren don't. And, with only a few exceptions, odds are the great mass of American humanity prefers to slap on the sun block and dive into summer's refreshing pool waters than to think of sealing up a "safe room" and huddling inside it if the "dirty bomb" explodes on or about the 4th of July.

Summer is a time to loll. It's a time to recharge the batteries. A time to thaw from cold, wet winters. It's time to remove the pasty pall of winter and let the skin turn golden brown as we baste and glow healthy looking from the outside.

But, there are countless numbers of us who, forgetting about external Terrorism, still have our Internal Terrorists gnawing at the marrow of our being even when the sun is glistening and the birds are chirping.

Take bathing suits, for example.

Summer brings its glory and joy, but also its nightmares.

Real Terrorism is seeing how we look in a bathing suit

Rolls of fat hidden by the winter coats and thick layers of shirts and sweaters are now free to jiggle and ooze over the edges of waistbands, exposing our secret Terror that we are not as young, as firm, as trim, as attractive as either we might have once been, or in comparison to those whose bodies look as though they had just been sculpted by Michelangelo.

We tend to forget that one of the greatest fears we face each day is the Mirror Terrorist.

He or she is the creature who casts back upon us a reflection that is warped by reality. It indicates that our bodies have become victims of the Gravity Terrorist, and that our flesh--once taut with youth--has stretched and become burdened by adipose tissue attack.

Around our waits, thighs, buttocks, chests and chins hangs, jiggles and Jell-as much more flesh than we imagined during the freezing, chilly nights where those extra fat cells served to keep us cuddly unto ourselves. Now that our clothing is being shed by Nature's necessity, the bulges pop out like so many warts marching over our noses, and all we can see is the fact we are not equal to, or even near parity to any ad we see on television, the magazine or newspapers representing what the human body should appear to be when it is shed of its layers of cloth.

This is real Terrorism.

A Terror Monstor lives inside of our fat cells

While the percentages of another Terrorist plane crashing into a building is remote, the odds of any of us feeling like a slug crawling along the pavement of life when we gaze at our near-naked reflections in the morning mirror are so real and practicable that feeling "less-than" is about as real as breathing or sneezing.

Our Terror Monster lives inside our fat cells.

But, let's not discriminate.

There are those of us too, who feel we are far too skinny.

Some of us look in the mirror and see a rack of bones, a meatless exoskeletal figure who, turning sideways, disappears from sight.

I grew up a skinny kid

I grew up a skinny kid. People called me "spider legs." I had pimples to boot. I was sure I was an "ugly stick" whose only attractiveness bent toward a Praying Mantis. Now, I'm huge. The mirror I look in today shoots back this hulking blob of once-firm flesh, sagging here and there and everywhere with such ferocity that girdling myself is not an option I discard since dieting just can't compete with Ben & Jerry ice cream sales.

I live in Fear, Intimiation and the Complacency I was never going to be "like others,"--i.e. physically attractive. I compared myself to the "lookers" and lost the battle every time I looked in the mirror. I even answered a Charle Atlas (an old but famous icon of how to not let someone kick sand in your face) and practiced his "Dynamic Tension" techniques in hopes my body would transform miraculously into some beach lifeguard form so I could strut around like the cock-of-the-walk and crow about my physical magnificence.

Those who manage our HomeLand Security in Washington D.C. would scoff at the idea that America's true Summer Terrorism isn't worrying about the "dirty bomb" but rather the "dirty mirror" in their bathroom, that belies the truth they are not worthy of shedding their clothing and matching the pictures of the "hard bodies" streaming across their television screens or plastered on the cover of People.

But the reality is that we do, indeed, Terrorize our self-image daily by thinking we are "ugly" or that we are "less than" because we don't meet certain "attractive" standards we set.

The Beast of Terror licks his summer chops over this fact. He thrives on our insatiable desire to compare ourselves to those we want to be, and does flip flops because we walk around blowing up our self-image every time we fix our gaze on another person we think is "more" than we in attractiveness.

Instead of trimming down and working to become more fit, we are lured into the Ben & Jerry sale, and bury our snouts in Heath Bar Crunch, gobbling up scads of fats as though we were prisoners of our own self-deprecation. We put the Fat Terror Gun to our own heads. We torture ourselves by resigning our minds that "we're always going to be like this--fat and ugly or thin and scrawny."

So what do we do?

In any Moment of Terror we have a choice.

Our only options are ... to live in the Shadow of Terror.....

We can become Sentinels of Vigilance or surrender to the Beast of Terror.

There are no other real options.

We are living in the shadow of Terror or the sunlight of Vigilance.

... or the Sunlight of Vigilance

If we are Vigilant, we think in terms not of how we appear vis-a-vis others, but rather how healthy we are. If we really want to compare ourselves to ourselves, the question is are we happy with what we see on the scales and what we put in our mouths--not in relation to rising above others or living in the quagmire of being less than them, but more akin to what is right for the people we love and care about--the Children.

A Parent of Vigilance, a Citizen of Vigilance, a Loved One of Vigilance, a Grandparent of Vigilance each has his or her own private goal to live the longest, healthiest, happiest life so that he or she can pass on the health, happiness and longevity of life to the next set of generations.

Thus, how we look, act and feel becomes important not to just those whom we pass by and stare at in comparison to what we look like, but, more importantly, to the children, to our loved ones who look upon us as role models.

If we care about what we look like from a healthy, happy and longivity viewpoint, we will do what is right for our bodies for the right reasons.

Keeping trim and fit is a gift to our children, grandchildren and loved ones. It's hard to compete with a child's energy when you have none, or to laugh when you are sad because you feel "ugly" and "gross."

If we wallow in the Complacency of our own disrespect for our health, we rob our children and loved ones of the pleasure of our best company.

Stuffing our faces and sitting on the couch only bloats our Beast of Terror's gut. When we're too tired, too hungry, too full of gas to move, we leave our children and loved ones to the mercy of the Beast, who will, as he or she did with us, make them feel like we did when we were children.

But, if we're active and healthy and fit, we can take the children by the hand and dance with them in the sunlight of the summer. We can be fit for them and banish the Beast of Physical Terror away.

How can this seemingly minor goal help fight Terrorism?

Choose to be fit and healthy

Internal Fear, Intimidation and Complacency suffocates us--whether it be based on what we think of ourselves or a more global resignation from caring about what happens in the next election.

The more Complacent we become physically, the more that impacts our minds and our voices and our belief in fighting for the rights of the future generations.

This is true Summer Vigilance

Keeping fit is a piece of the Vigilance Pie. Eating the pie is piece of the Terrorist plot.

So, we can all choose.

We can chose to be fit and healthy for ourselves and our children and loved ones--and not to impress those around us.

This is true Summer Vigilance.

 

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