The Iconic Meditation: Golf Theory

A college athlete spends quarantine time actively but is compelled to consider the forces of the world that are making civilization rather...dialogic!

And here's just one more Coronavirus prayer, inspired by the films Tin Cup and Diabolique. Thanks so much for reading,

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Ajay always wore golf-gloves while he was practicing golf at a local golf park in California. He was attending UCLA and was a member of the men's golf team and was on summer vacation in 2020. Even though the Coronavirus pandemic was going on, Ajay took time to go to the golf park and play 2 hours in the early morning with his golf-gloves worn. He always wore his golf-gloves to that golf park to practice that summer.

Ajay also purchased a golf video-game for practice at home. This enabled him to hone his skills with eye-targeting and mental focus. He played that golf video-game for hours when he wasn't practicing at the golf park outdoors. He always took care to sanitize his hands and wash up to prevent any Coronavirus contamination, as recommended by most doctors on TV. Ajay even wore his golf-gloves sometimes while he was playing his intuitive golf video-game at home.

Ajay considered his golf video-game experience a mental and symbolic extension of his imaginative and willful interest in the cool and confident sport of golf. Even though the Coronavirus had created a terrible global crisis and quarantine consciousness, Ajay practiced golf that summer at the golf park near his California house in the early morning and then practiced targeting on his golf video-game during the afternoons and early evenings. Ajay almost always wore his golf-gloves while doing these intensive activities designed to prepare him mentally in case the Coronavirus was quickly cured and he could return to UCLA and continue playing golf with the college team.

One day, on his way to the golf park, Ajay crossed paths with a strange-looking individual who wanted to converse. This stranger had rather long and scruffy white hair and wore a top-hat with a playing-card tucked in it and a rather colorful coat and neck-ribbon. This stranger told Ajay he liked people calling him the 'Mad Hatter' (a reference to the iconic fictional Lewis Carroll logic-trickster figure from the funny novels Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass). The stranger ('Mad Hatter') told Ajay he'd like to 'debate' with him about Coronavirus quarantine experience and optimism, and Ajay felt like he couldn't refuse the strange-looking fellow.

AJAY: Why're you dressed so strangely during this time of global dread?

HATTER: I like playing the role of the Mad Hatter during this Coronavirus panic.
AJAY: Why?
HATTER: As you can tell from my appearance and demeanor, I'm a man of criticism.
AJAY: Are you a natural skeptic or something?
HATTER: I'm indeed critical of humanity's apathy towards mass mobilization.
AJAY: So, you're concerned that governments are not handling quarantine notes properly?
HATTER: I'm curious to know why you're off to the golf park on this early morning.
AJAY: I practice golf outdoors almost everyday in the early morning.
HATTER: Are you mentally preparing for the scenario that the Coronavirus will subside?

AJAY: Yes, and then I'll be prepared to return to college and play with the school team!
HATTER: So you venture outdoors every morning to practice golf during the quarantine.
AJAY: Yes, and then I stay indoors for the rest of the day, and I often play video-games.
HATTER: What kind of video-games?
AJAY: Mostly my Tiger Woods golf video-game on my Playstation.
HATTER: Oh, I see; that's interesting.
AJAY: Why's that?
HATTER: Well, you're keeping busy and psychologically motivated during quarantine time.
AJAY: Indeed.
HATTER: Well, it's interesting that you're so active and enthusiastic, while others are morose!

AJAY: Morose?
HATTER: Yes, not everyone is diligent and idealistic about using quarantine time wisely, you know.
AJAY: I suppose different people are dealing with quarantine experience differently!
HATTER: So you're curious to know why I'm dressed as the Mad Hatter during this quarantine stress?
AJAY: I suppose I am.
HATTER: Well, as you might induce, I've been taking mental notes like a comedic anthropologist.
AJAY: What kind of notes?
HATTER: I've been noting how different people venturing outside during quarantine are spending time.
AJAY: You're surveying the degrees of normality or sanity or duty during the Coronavirus quarantine?
HATTER: Indeed!
AJAY: Why?
HATTER: I'm convinced that the virus quarantine will not make people more faithful towards life roles.

AJAY: Are you implying that the Coronavirus panic will lead to forms of random and chaotic urban crime?
HATTER: I do believe it's a possibility, since, after all, people tend to blow with the breeze and follow their gut!
AJAY: So you think this time of mass panic will not sanitize humanity but could rather provoke people into riots?
HATTER: It's certainly possible.
AJAY: Anything's possible, I suppose, Mad Hatter, but don't you think people think more about medical welfare now?
HATTER: Certainly, everyone's concerned about social health, but criminality is an instinct or urge that will never die!

AJAY: I'm sure that's sort of true, Mad Hatter, but consider how horror-films entice our curiosity about chaos and control.
HATTER: Horror-films?
AJAY: Yes, Mad Hatter; horror-films are psychiatric tools engaging us to re-express our fears of sanity loss.
HATTER: Are you suggesting that people sitting at home during Coronavirus quarantine will enjoy horror-films more?
AJAY: I do think so; at least these horror-films on television will remind people under quarantine of basic mental comforts!

HATTER: So your conviction is that access to worldly stimuli will remind people of the value of social sanity.
AJAY: Indeed; isn't that the real logic of Dairy Queen dessert shops --- amenities creating life light?
HATTER: I suppose images of comfort offer thoughts of civility, but horror-films also present ideas about villainy.
AJAY: No one can stop the concept of villainy...not even with words or ideas about gymnasiums.
HATTER: That's interesting too, from a gothic standpoint!

It was clear to Ajay that this stranger who called himself the 'Mad Hatter' was a deep thinker who was thinking seriously if somewhat morbidly about the contours of social apathy in times of great mass crisis. This 'Mad Hatter' individual was obviously some kind of Machiavellian person who didn't like to make light of the social duties and roles created by crisis. Ajay was fascinated by this person's overall sense of social criticism and decided to invite him to his house so they could play his iconic Shinobi video-game on his Sega Genesis video-game system. As Ajay and the 'Mad Hatter' played this fantasy-adventure ninja-samurai combat game on Ajay's Genesis, the Hatter wondered if modern amenities really did create 'social' dance.

As Ajay and Hatter enjoyed their rousing ninja-samurai combat video-game on the Sega Genesis, a classic video-game system, Ajay thought about all the kinds of activities that comprised the Coronavirus quarantine experience around the modern world. Would anthropologists in the future look back on this period of tribulation and note design...or depression?

Ajay decided to take time off golf and devoted some more time to his other hobby, painting. He decided to make a colorful and delightful painting of a beautiful American actress on TV and render the painting as a symbol of his overall social praise of quarantine-time diligence. He noted how the painting itself reminded him of the special value of diarism.

Ajay wondered if all his newfound enlightenment had brought him to a greater understanding of the deep complexity of social behavior and human imagination! Was the Coronavirus quarantine experience making people more or less sensitive about unified sanity? Ajay decided to get a book on Amazon about the metaphysical symbolism of the great Blue Dragon, an archaic creature symbolizing deep philosophical complexity regarding the tangibility of both darkness...and deformity!

Ajay then got a special Batman (DC Comics) storybook about the fictional brooding American socialite-businessman Bruce Wayne coming to terms with his troubled past and reconciling his passion for leadership with his yearning for vigilante justice and donning the secret night-time identity of the masked crusader known as Batman. As Ajay read this biographical portrait of Bruce Wayne becoming the dark knight known as Batman, he wondered if his time at UCLA, playing golf for the school team, had made him more or less sensitive about social detention!

AJAY: "If we do get through this Coronavirus tribulation awesomely, I hope we'll look back on how we spent quarantine-time and consider the ways we balanced darkness with diet. If we do that, I'll feel that much better about just returning to my life as a collegiate athlete."

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"Money is everything" (Ecclesiastes)

Reviews

[Christina Hill]

I love this writing piece. It challenged me to take a close look at myself during this time of the pandemic.
We should all be like the character in this story; being introspective while making sure one is peaceful, normal and productive during times of solitude.