A metaphor for change

It’s been almost a year since I started this journal; and almost a year since the fall of the Key Bridge, the event that has inspired many of my musings. Tomorrow night on the local PBS station there is to be a retrospect special about the collapse and all that has transpired in the year since. I will of course be tuning in for that, and I’m sure I’ll have some commentary on it. As of now, plans are in place to both remove the remains of the damaged bridge, and also the foundation of the riverbed is being drilled into and tested for stability. They are looking for the most suitable places to drive pilings to support the piers of the new bridge. In addition, this next iteration of the Key Bridge will be specifically built with avoidance in mind of the disaster that demolished the first bridge. As the saying goes, one must understand history in order to not have it repeat, unless of course what you are wanting to repeat is beneficial. And even then, studying the past still is key in order to accomplish goals.

Quite recently I’ve begun drilling down into part of my own history by going thru dozens and dozens of old computer hard disks and CDs that I had stored away for more than a decade. The impetus for that was my husband’s impending retirement. I used to do most of my office work for my business on my laptop in our living room. But trying to do any sort of real work when my husband is watching TV and playing noisy games is nigh impossible. Therefore I knew I would have to clean out my basement office so I could have a quiet place to work. What was supposed to be my office was piled with junk that I had barely touched since we got married years ago. I need all the space I can get, as our house hasn’t much storage areas, to say the least. Therefore I am going thru all that old media and copying files onto more modern storage. So much of what I found has to do with an epic battle I fought some 20 years ago against a terrible phobia I had (which I noted in my last entry). I’ll of course never forget fighting this horrid fear, but what I had forgotten is all those people who helped me get over it. Somehow I had gathered an army of helpers, most of them people I never met face to face, to arm me against the fear. At the time I don’t think I fully appreciated all of the advice that was freely given to me. And I had forgotten so many of the nuances and related issues that went along with it.

But what has struck me is the similarities of those past battles with what I’m going thru now. The embodiment of my phobia (and those who represented it) were monsters; they were horrible, evil people – not unlike in the way the Key Bridge became a metal monster to me. There was something there I needed to defeat, to somehow destroy, although not literally. But also, in the wake of destruction came the opportunity for rebuilding, just like what is happening with the Key Bridge. I tore those damaged thoughts and nightmares apart in my mind (and in reality) and set about rebuilding them to replace something fearful with something I could deal with. I really haven’t figured out all of what my current “re-building project” has for its end goal. But I do know I’ve been down a very similar path before. Back then my way of tackling the phobia was to eventually engage with the very people and places that stoked terror in me. Fast forward to now where I have been going about engaging with metal monsters, their creators and those/that which are associated with them. I worked at the phobia, chipping it away until it eventually dissipated, like the sun burning off a thick fog. Then I could clearly see that my fears were unfounded. The only difference now is I’m not 100% sure as to what I’m trying to get past, as the monster bridge is much more metaphorical than the near literal “demons” I once feared.

I suppose that perhaps in some way, the fall of the Key Bridge is a metaphor for change; the destruction of the past and the renewal of the future. Change that was unfortunately instigated out of something tragic and dreadful, not unlike the way a single incident marked a course of change in my life.