Cocoon. How does that word strike you? My old roommate in college, BK, used to say that he wanted to live in a cocoon - especially during the winter months. My friend and former band-mate Matt used to actually live in a sleeping bag for several months of the Wisconsin winter - he spent as many waking hours at home as possible in his sleeping bag. The sleeping bag was this sub-arctic mummy-shaped affair that almost looked like some kind of insect body - it resembled a ribbed abdomen, and if Matt could have just poked some antennae out of the top, it would have completed the effect.
Is there a point in the winter when we just want to crawl into a bag and hang suspended upside-down from the limb of a tree? No, I don't think that is quite what we are looking for. It has something to do with security, probably - security or anonymity. A cocoon is not all that secure in reality - it is soft and is prone to having the fangs of a predatory insect sunk into its juicy little cargo. Perhaps it is the anonymity and the "head in the sand" effect that we crave. Make it all go away for a while. Make it seem dark and quiet. Make me not care. Is that where alcohol and drugs come in? Perhaps they are all one in the same desire - the drugs and alcohol just being for those with addictive personalities and the rest of us wishing for a cocoon.
There was someone, I forget who, who said that "one martini is just right, two is too many and three is not enough." I bet he was a cocoon-wisher...I'll bet you anything.
I just slapped my Yankees cap onto my noggin and off I go to do some house cleaning and laundry. My Yankees cap - purchased on Fifth Avenue back in 2005 - is going to be my surrogate cocoon for the day. Pull it on, and forget about the praying mantises that are trying to stab their pointy mandibles into my juicy little abdomen.
Wait a second...I don't see any praying mantises around. Maybe it's time for a Martini, instead...
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