adventures in the flotation tank

     There are two kinds of people: those who, when they read about sensory deprivation in flotation tanks, think, "I've got to do that someday," and those that just underline sensory deprivation and study it for the test.
     Actually, no! That can't be right. Because I underline it and think "I've got to do that someday." So maybe there is only one type of person. Maybe everyone wants to be weightless and floating in complete darkness and silence in a tank. Maybe I've found the difference between humans and other species. It's not the ability to use tools: it's the desire to try a flotation tank.

     Lo and behold, in this fantabulous 21st century, flotation tanks have moved out of research labs and into spas. Psych labs have long used them to test the effects of sensory deprivation on stressed out people. It turns out that being weightless, in complete darkness and in total silence, is so relaxing you kind of lose touch with your body. It can help with addictions, with stress, pain, fatigue -- all the general effects of living in a world where sound, light, and gravity prevail.
     Oh, sure, some people report having hallucinations, and some are miffed that while floating their brains just seem not to want to do much of anything. While floating, they are too spaced out to think, and that bothers them. But having my brain lose its get-up-and-go for 60 minutes has always sounded pretty good to me, to tell you the truth. Being too relaxed to think, for me, I knew would be a very salubrious thing.

     So I book a float session. And for what feels like a long time I can hardly wait to stop hardly waiting for it or for anything else and just be floating in the silent darkness.
     David greets me at the desk. He says that no one has booked the tank after me, and asks if I would like to stay for 90 minutes. Yes, yes, yes, please! I am like the kid who is next in line for the elephant ride at the Bronx Zoo. That means excited, in case you are the second of the two kinds of people in the world: those who want to ride an elephant and those who have no desire whatsoever. David walks me to the tank room, and gives me a little orientation session.
     When he leaves, I shower off, then step into the tank and lie down in a body-temperature solution that contains 1000 pounds of epsom salts. I turn off the little blue light that helps you find your way into the water, lie back, and float in the darkness.
     How do I describe the feeling?
     Would blowtorch to the privates be too strong?
"A Bic® lighter to the loins" definitely understates the sensation. I lie there and wonder if I have perhaps accidentally gotten into one of those tubs that gradually eats away at the flesh. I have a flash of David, annoyed that I have overstayed my appointment time, finally coming to get me and finding that I've completely dissolved.
     Maybe I have died and have been sent to the Spa of Hell, I think, as I try to have that experience where your brain is too spaced out to think anything at all. I think of all the mistakes I've made, all the wrongs I've committed, and I'm just not sure the punishment fits my admittedly many crimes. This seems over the top.
 
I think it would be best to have this story take place in two blog entries. I'll leave you to float for a few days. Try to think about nothing at all.
   

   

how we know we are one

Hi, everyone. I know you're there, even though most of you never make a peep. I am feeling extra connected to the whole raggedy human family today, and I can see you and feel you.

It's not often that you walk down the street and know that most people are thinking the same thing you are thinking, but that's how it's been today. Even the cashier at Whole Foods, or the person who is backing out their car as you negotiate with your eyes which person will go first, or the person at the post office who takes your package -- everyone, in the spaces between other things, is thinking about what happened to those families yesterday.

We keep moving through our days, we the lucky ones who have days that are far enough from the tragedy not to be wholly paralyzed by it. But there is something within that you can feel in your belly, and now and then you think, "What is this I am feeling?" and then you remember. The feeling surges for a long moment, like a wail, and then you go back to putting away the groceries. You have a brief conversation with someone you love. It is mundane, soothing in its smallness. Did you give the dog his aspirin? You wrap the aspirin in some goat cheese and the dog snarfs it into his toothless mouth. As you rinse off your fingertips, there is a space again. You let the water run over your hands, and you picture those children, and the parents who loved them, the sisters and brothers and grandparents and cousins and uncles and aunts and teachers and friends and neighbors and people driving by on Route 84 and people cooking supper for their families on the other side of the world. You come back to the unimaginable scene that you must imagine, and you think of the people who searched for their children afterwards and squeezed them so hard, sobbing with relief and grief, somehow both in one agonized, joyful, excruciating embrace. And then you imagine the unimaginable experience of the parents whose children were not in the crowd of living, breathing, crying children, and you can see those parents shatter into pieces, you can hear the howl of their pain and you realize you might not be able to bear what they are having to bear.

It all happens in that long moment standing by the sink. You turn off the water and don't know what else to do than to go back to what you were doing and wait for the next surge of sadness.

This is how we know that we are bits of one large thing; it is this feeling in my belly and in yours. I know you are there. I can see you and feel you.