I am finally recovering from a pneumonia which started over a week ago.
One night, during one of the fever induced nightmares, I kept seeing myself running down the middle of a street chased by unseen monsters. It was a street out of my childhood, I recognized the houses and the trees, even the neighbors, but the disconcerting thing was that the traffic was coming in the opposite direction it should. I kept dodging cars and buses coming from unexpected directions at intersections. All traffic was running in the opposite direction. Suddenly I woke up, agitated and sweating.
The TV was still tuned to Faux Noise as I had left it on when I felt asleep. Thoughts raced through my mind. Then something clicked.
I had woken up from one nightmare into another. In this real nightmare America is ruled by monsters and everything is going backwards; the world hates us, we have become the greatest debtor nation ever, torture is rampant, the Constitution means nothing, war has no end. Let’s call it the anti-America.
It reminded me of a David Lynch film. In a strange way, this gave me hope.
Much more over the flip.
Standard film scripts are linear in structure. They have a beginning a middle and an end. A more elaborate description of such a typical screenplay can be found here. This chart is from the same source;
Other screenplays are circular rather than just linear. They may start with the end then jump to the beginning and eventually make it back to where they started. Or they may follow the circular Hero’s Journey as described here;
Then there is David Lynch.
You may remember him as the director of Twin Peaks, that bizarre TV series.
In his widely released films Lost Highwayand Mulholland Drive, David Lynch chooses instead a Mobius flip structure. I believe these two films received poor reviews precisely because this unique structure. I liked them very much (especially Mullholand Drive due to the casting of the lovely Naomi Watts as its central character). The reason I liked them is because I understood exactly what David Lynch did with the script structure, once I did everything made sense.
At one point, during one scene in each movie, there is a break in the reality. All of a sudden everything flips. One character becomes another. In the case of Lost Highway a character driving down the highway switches bodies with someone in a prison cell. In Mullholand Drive, Naomi Watts’ character goes into a motel room and emerges as a different character. The storylines are flipped, things start running backwards. And things start going horribly wrong, what was normal becomes nightmarish. Eventually the storylines return to the beginning in a sort of circular fashion but upside down. Heaven has become Hell.
If you don’t believe me hear it from David Lynch’s own words here;
The story melts prior to the beginning to arrive at the end. More than a circle it is a spiral or a Moebius Strip which is twisted around itself.
This is how a Mobius Strip looks like
This is how you make one; you cut, flip and then you glue the flipped ends.
The characters in a Mobius screenplay find themselves on the opposite side of the strip after one turn, in an upside down world like in this moving rendition of an Escher drawing.
So Shockwave, what does all this have to do with our National Nightmare?
My insight the other night is that we are inside a David Lynch Mobius flip.
How did we get here?
The Cut
The cut was the "selection" of George W. Bush as President in 2000. This was a complete break from the past. A psychopath became the most powerful man on earth, surrounded by a cast of monsters. This man is unprecedented in the history of America; he does not belong in the White House.
The Flip
The flip was September 11, 2001. This was a shocking event that flipped us upside down. We gave W full power beyond anything anyone other President ever had.
The Glue
The Iraq invasion was what glued the flipped ends of the strip to turn it into a Mobius strip. We are stuck now. No exit strategy in sight. Yeah we have a Congress that wants to get out, but W is in the White House and he still has many cards to play.
So how do we wake up from this nightmare?
We need to reverse the process.
The New Cut
First somebody else in the White House, by impeachment preferably or in 2008 if we survive that long without some even greater catastrophe like war with Iran or martial law.
The New Flip
Second a flipping event. I don’t know. Use your imagination. This event we need to cause ourselves. Perhaps we offer the whole world a cure for cancer or hunger for free or we stop global warming on its tracks.
The New Glue
Finally the gluing process. Again Kossacks use your vast brains. Perhaps we put into effect a plan to withdraw from our global military hegemon footprint and reduce our military budget to something reasonable and use the proceeds to pay our debts, balance the budget and become again the Shining City on the Hill.
I had to get this diary off my feverish mind.