Brin (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
brin_bellway) wrote2023-02-13 01:01 pm
brin_bellway) wrote2023-02-13 01:01 pm
(no subject)
[cw: apocalypse, death, amnesia (in link)]
It's interesting how, in nightmares about nuclear war, I'm always calm.
Plagues are scary. Asteroid impacts are scary. Men in black are scary.
But nukes? Those are just "Okay, I guess this is my life now. Curl up away from windows and things likely to fall on you until the shockwaves pass, check; hole up in the basement for a few days while the fallout decays, check. Let's get to work, then. Hey guys, neighbour says she'll trade us a breeding pair of meat rabbits if I keep her MP3 player charged off my solar panel, time to go build a hutch--"
I suppose nuclear war *does* traditionally symbolise acceptance of inevitable death (and ensuing fatalism), but traditionally the inevitable death in question applies on an *individual* level. Presumably my internal symbolism would bear more resemblance to that if I lived in D.C. or something, but I live in Kitchener. No, better, *rural Kitchener area*.
*My* nuclear-war dreams seem to be about facing the inevitable demise of my *civilisation* with equanimity and determination.
---
(Equanimity, determination, and *teamwork*. I already mentioned the trading in the latest one; in one we and the other people at the hotel all worked together and did the whole trauma-bonding thing; in one I emerged from underground to find everyone throwing a town-wide barbecue to use up the meat in their now-useless freezers. A couple people had set up canners on wood stoves and were working on the formerly frozen vegetables.)
It's interesting how, in nightmares about nuclear war, I'm always calm.
Plagues are scary. Asteroid impacts are scary. Men in black are scary.
But nukes? Those are just "Okay, I guess this is my life now. Curl up away from windows and things likely to fall on you until the shockwaves pass, check; hole up in the basement for a few days while the fallout decays, check. Let's get to work, then. Hey guys, neighbour says she'll trade us a breeding pair of meat rabbits if I keep her MP3 player charged off my solar panel, time to go build a hutch--"
I suppose nuclear war *does* traditionally symbolise acceptance of inevitable death (and ensuing fatalism), but traditionally the inevitable death in question applies on an *individual* level. Presumably my internal symbolism would bear more resemblance to that if I lived in D.C. or something, but I live in Kitchener. No, better, *rural Kitchener area*.
*My* nuclear-war dreams seem to be about facing the inevitable demise of my *civilisation* with equanimity and determination.
---
(Equanimity, determination, and *teamwork*. I already mentioned the trading in the latest one; in one we and the other people at the hotel all worked together and did the whole trauma-bonding thing; in one I emerged from underground to find everyone throwing a town-wide barbecue to use up the meat in their now-useless freezers. A couple people had set up canners on wood stoves and were working on the formerly frozen vegetables.)