10 years ago I enjoyed shooting with a miniature rifle. I remember us drawing people and animals on cardboard, and then trying to hit them from 50 m or 100 or whatever it was. We used to practise behind the greenhouse, and the echo of the shots bounced back from the hills further away. There was a feeling of power and masculinity, and it felt good. Surprisingly I even did well in a shooting competition. Well ok, we weren´t that many in the womens class, but anyway... But I never felt like trying this on living creatures, so the charm of firing slowly faded away. Nowadays it´s highly unlikely that I would ever hit anything. Quite recently I´ve had to accept how much I suck at throwing snowballs...
But this with the feeling of power was what I wanted to mention. In many cases it´s the opposite of fear. You have control and strength. This can be physical or something completely different. There was lots of people with fear in "the Passion of the Christ" that I saw last night. Fear of the unknown. And I see it in the children in my work. Anger in fear of changes.
While I walked in the forest today I thought about religion. On one hand, we´re free to find our own truth today. The chains of forced religion are gone in big parts of the world. On the other hand, - there´s loads of people suffering from depression, loneliness or lack of meaning in life. We desperately build constructions that keep us safe from natures way, may it then be by shopping, drinking, organising or whatever manic hobbies, perversions or ways we have. Life is too big and complex to handle. Inside a religion we always have something to fall back on, - "It must be Gods will." Without "Gods will" life just becomes bigger in proportion to me, and it frightens. No control, no power.
Back to the forest. I met a moose-family. As the wind came from their direction, they didn´t notice me, and I could watch them for quite a while. As I stood there I came to think of something that Klaus the Whaling historian said after his lecture (that ended in revolt) last summer. With his words: ..."killing a whale is amazing. It might be more fantastic than seeing your own child be born. There´s an awe that everyone on board feels..." Interesting was how many emotions fitted inside the same walls that evening in july. I would say I recognised fear, anger and power, but also a mixture of these in something that looked like a religion. Fascinating human beeing.What strange forms our struggle takes...
