It’s Crazy
The word “crazy” is used to describe many situations and is uttered so often for so many occasions that it may have little meaning. When someone wrote to me saying it “makes me crazy” to see me post a picture of someone lying in the road my first reaction wasn’t about the business on the road, but rather how a photograph can make them “crazy”. Vexed maybe, perplexed or even angry. But crazy?
The road to crazy winds through some fuzzy territory. For this post I’m going to define “crazy” as irritated, agitated, wound up, pissed off and generally ready to bite.
Words and pictures don’t make me crazy. They can trigger emotions, thoughts and ideas but alone, in isolation, they don’t make me crazy.
Fools and Idiots
Every time I see this photograph it makes me crazy that I didn’t crack open that book, “The Idiot” to see what it was about — lost opportunities haunt me. Thinking about it now it probably has my picture on page one.
Spend all day reciting words to me and I won’t go crazy. Butcher the pronunciation of countless terms, add sounds and tone to words, illuminate the most vulgar curse words and you may illicit a yawn. The words have no power standing alone — for me at least. The idea, malice or cruelty behind a word, that’s a different story. But misuse of a word, call my Vespa a moped — no crazy here.
Actions can make me crazy though. Saw a guy standing in the park on my way to work, his dog was taking a dump. His body language indicated “no need to pick that up” and my rear view mirror confirmed the suspicion. It makes me crazy that people don’t clean up after their dogs. Crazy is imagining the gathering of said dog logs and mailing them to his home for Valentine’s Day.
Similar crazy reactions emerge in the face of loud motorcycles or leaf blowers that run continuously for more than two hours. It transforms me and sets me off on an ugly journey. I hate being on the road to crazy because the whole world seems inhabited by fools and idiots.
Crazy Riding
Film director Tim Burton (Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, Beetlejuice, Batman, Edward Scissorhands) has said,
“One person’s craziness is another person’s reality.” It drives some people crazy that I write about riding the Vespa in the snow. One particularly noxious exchange on a forum indicated that my craziness is likely responsible for the demise of some riders.
That’s crazy. If I had power over people I wouldn’t be sending them out riding in the snow. They would be mailing me cash.
There have been times though were I’ve been picking my way along a snow covered road where I think I heard a voice in my head whisper, “This is crazy”.
That’s crazy.
Detour Off the Road to Crazy
In spite of any crazy, nutty reactions or behaviors, mine or someone else’s, riding seems to provide a welcome detour toward a more relaxed and serene journey. I’ve been riding regularly now for over ten years and don’t often see crazy. When it does enter my field of view, I know what to do.
Ride!
Cray-cray…
Yeah, it’s really crazy isn’t it!
Voices in your head? Nahhh…
The pic of that dear GTS getting a tad too intimate with all that snow? That startled me a bit. But I’m okay. (‘Course, had it been mine…)
So much rain yesterday. But it made lots of snow disappear. Peeked into the shed yesterday, fired up Melody for a minute (no problem). Today we ride. Banish the crazy!
That was one of a few photographic injuries. Always be careful where you park your scooter.
Hope you had a fine ride.
Crazy is having dodged the bullet and then figuring where to go from here, or there!
Crazy is battling major illneses for seven or eight (years in my case) and realizing all of your anchors and strongholds have up and left; and the the normal assumed strongholds of religion, prayer, meditation, friends, pets, stuffedanimals; everything you knew and cherished and yes loved no longer work for you.
Losing strongholds would make a man crazy, or at least color perspective on the road ahead. I hope you find some return unlooked for. I’ve found that true for myself — a welcome port in the storm.
Best wishes for brighter days.
I have got crazy covered, much to my wife’s dismay. Thank god she has put up with it and me for 30 years.
It’s amazing (and frightening at times) to realize someone decided we’re worth putting up with. It’s a blessing.
Only the picture in the snow “perplexes” me. In my head I see fluids running into places that either put them on the ground, out engine breathers or into places they don’t belong. I would be on it in a flash to get it upright, not taking a picture. My Mechanic side would override my Artistic side.
It looks worse than it is Jim. I got off the scooter and walked over to take a picture. While composing the center stand sunk into the mud beneath the snow and fell over. I snapped the picture and ran over to pick up the Vespa because I have the same concerns you shared. It wasn’t the first time the camera was involved in a topple. Just the first time I took the picture instead of a panicked dash to the fallen machine.
Crazy is in the eye of the beholder…..
As to the first picture, used to do that but on my stomach to get that “low level angle”….its why I love my current camera and its flippable LCD display…..no more laying on the ground….people still think I’m doing something weird and stop asking if I’m ok though….
More than once I’ve wished my G15 had an articulated screen for those low angle shots but I almost never resort to lying on the ground for a photo. I just hold it on the ground and shoot a series until I get the composition I want.
I get a lot of people stopping to ask if I need help while making photos. It’s nice to know people care enough these days to offer.
Voices in your head aren’t crazy, they’re helpful. Usually.
I love that first picture. It doesn’t make me feel anything but happy because I have seen your work enough to know with relative certainty that you were probably 100% aware of whether or not you were about to be run over.
Yes, an owner ignoring his/her dog’s logs would make me crazy, as would annoying, repetitive noises. I can usually tune-out lawnmowers and weedwhackers, but tapping? THAT sends me on the road to crazy in a heartbeat.
Riding is an antidote for many ills.
“Riding is an antidote for many ills” — that’s perfect. Funny you mention the awareness on the road because I’ve often thought if something bad is going to happen during a ride it will be while I”m making photographs. I pay close attention to what’s happening but often I stop with help on and earplugs in and I’m largely deaf to sounds and have to pay attention visually. That’s probably a stupid thing to do.
It’s not often that I’d ever give anyone enough control over me to “make me crazy”. I’ve seen some crazy, idiotic things but they don’t make me feel that way.
Ignore the voices in your head as they’ll make you crazy…
I’ll have to work to get to your level of acceptance Richard. There are still things that make me crazy. And it drives me crazy that it drives me crazy.