Stanislav Szukalski's "Struggle" - One of my all-time favorite sculptures, which I found in my passenger seat- to be crated and shipped off amidst a rough patch in my life. The irony was indeed all too real. Circa North Hollywood when I used to work for a sculpture foundry and I think it mighta been 2004…
We've heard it on repeat in movies, in person, and maybe even dealt it. The SCREAM! The automated response to what seems like a massive hand reaching down and squeezing you to your full -extent- and potentially crushing you instantaneously between your fingers. LESS that" hand of God" that scored a goal for Maradona and finalized Argentina's win over England in that 1986 World Cup match, but another that does the sinister suckapunch that leaves you frozen in fear - eyes popping out of your skull. It was the internal top of my lungs shriek stepping 2 inches from a massive tarantula in my havaianas in Port-au-Prince well after midnight. PURE I SCREAM MODE. And NO ice cream to follow.
It is the pure intensity and hot flash of an internal explosion plus or minus the decibels, that sensation of stretching a rubber band to its max right before it snaps. That slightly eery yet notorious painting of Edvard Munch echoed by Macauley Caulkin in Home Alone. It is the temporary breaking of sanity and insanity- the darkest of night right before the dawn. It is the rush of adrenaline right before the cliffhanger drops you 6 feet under. It could be the paralysis that makes you choke on your words, the sudden electronic shock therapy, the arrow piercing your heart, and perhaps the reason Van Gogh sliced his own ear in the first place. His and the inability of others to vocalize and perform the scream- that drives them to commit crimes and murders of multiple degrees.
Perhaps it's induced by the rush of pain, shock, and paralysis that makes your heart skip a beat and retreat. Your tire punctured by that haphazard nail, and you in the 3 seconds of suspension as your bicycle does the 360 before breaking your jaw- the sudden surprise fuck you- that even you don't know how to respond to...or the strange amalgam of very disparate emotions triggered by the 12 year old approaching me that morning on my block- all too close for comfort- to intentionally disclose to me that he had a gun in his pocket and wondering the value of one's life and potentially losing it over $2, while realizing this boy could be my child.
YET we forget the scream that could just as quickly descend from the operatic gestures when the fat lady sings, the sheer delirium of victory when your favorite team or any team scores the winning goal in the very last second of overtime. Sometimes the sheer mix of emotion and too many bottled up in a singular moment - the all shook up message in a bottle that crossed the seas and miraculously finds you. And let's not forget the soundtrack shake of one's walls and corporal planet between the steamy sheets of one's pillow talk and the height of climactic passion.
Loving this excerpt from The Atlantic - A Scream Is the Same in Every Language - Science of Screaming dated July 2015 by Cari Romm, and the reminder that we enter this world in a cry- that first breath and entrance to becoming who we are- our long-awaited entry into this insane world:
"Screams are the one uncontroversially universal vocalization,” said David Poeppel, a professor of psychology and neural science at New York University. “This is the most obvious response to signal ‘Go away, run away.’ [Screams] in an evolutionary context far precede other vocalizations.” The ability to scream is innate; after drawing a breath, it’s one of the very first things a brand-new human will do upon entering the world. A scream can signal pleasure (like on a roller coaster) or enthusiasm (like at a hockey game), but more often, it signals a need for help: Screams of pain, screams of fear."
The roller coaster has always been there- or the option of riding one and being / choosing one always is. I welcomed "the Cliff Hanger" at Six Flags and that mere sensation of the heart and everyone's body dropping 10 stories in a perfect vertical that could have easily entailed your entrails flying out of you and wrapping them around your neck just enough to almost strangle you and yet leave you with a strange lingering thrill of adrenaline. When I was ten- and even then, it was a lot to digest.
NOW It is the diving bell, self-imposed incarcerated cell, reaching that wishing well- a momentary lapse perhaps of seeing both heaven and hell flash right before you.
Back on rotation, I've been thinking of my favorite version of the Wilhelm Scream- an honest ironic succumbing and calm acknowledgement that sometimes you just have to give in to what's 2 inches in front of you... and not just a soccer ball- but Pele, we got you on this one…
"I don't know about my dreams.
I don't know about my dreamin anymore.
All that I know is
I'm fallin, fallin, fallin, fallin.
Might as well fall in." -
The Bamboos - The Wilhelm Scream <<<CLICK & LISTEN HERE
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