The Hatchet Explains it All: An Introduction.
“It’s the god that heroin prays to…” – ‘To Be Alone’, Hozier.
A hatchet is a small axe with a short handle, designed for one-handed use.
The term: ‘bury the hatchet’, derives from the Native American custom of putting away weapons during peace talks and means, ‘to cease hostilities’.
The Hatchet is a pub in Bristol, England.
The reason I have chosen this as the title? A hatchet is both a cutting tool and a weapon, what a beautiful metaphor for what we are about to do.
… I’m so tired of all of it, every question, every answer. I thought I’d find truth here, or at least myself. Shall I tell you what I found instead? I’ve been here for years, exploring myself and the teachings of others, and all there is, all there really is, is an absolute vacation from reality.
When I was younger, fifteen, sixteen, my dad bought me a pair of orange pyjamas for Christmas. I hated them. Not just because he bought them for me, but I’m sure that was in there somewhere. It was because they represented everything I wasn’t. They were at least four sizes too big, so hung off me like a sack. They were lined with something, some fabric designed to keep you warm, but it just bunched up and irritated my skin. Lastly, the thing that irked me the most, they were orange!
I could look at these pyjamas three ways:
a. he really didn’t know the first thing about me,
b. these pyjamas represented what he saw in me, these pyjamas are what he bought for that person,
c. the pyjamas represented who he wanted me to be.
This wasn’t the first time he had made a mistake like this. When I was seven, and again when I was eight, he bought me a doll for Christmas, despite my seven- and eight-year history of never playing with dolls. My sister played with dolls, but I had never been interested. This brings up the same three points, had he not paid enough attention to me to know I wouldn’t like the dolls, was he trying to make me more like my sister by giving me dolls, or, in his reality, did he see me as someone who played with dolls?
Let’s go back to the pyjamas, as itchy and uncomfortable as they are. I was about to go to bed one night, I went to the living room to say goodnight. My uncle was visiting, he was in the living room chatting with my mum. He watched me walk in, a smile spread across his face, and he said:
“Here she comes, lady in red.” This confused me, before I realised, he was talking about the pyjamas.
“They’re not red, they’re orange.” I said back.
This started a ten-minute row which I then lost, even my mum agreed with him, my sister agreed with him, they were red pyjamas. So, who was right? Were they the colour-blind ones, or was I? Majority rules, so that made me the one who was wrong. What else was I wrong about? What else was I seeing differently to everyone else?
… I’ve been here for years, exploring myself and the teachings of others, and what have I learnt? There’s a fault in reality, in the fact that there is none. There is no reality if everyone sees and experiences something different. Reality is nothing more than a set of ideas that a group of individuals have all agreed on. What happens when you don’t agree? You’re labelled as the anomaly, as the strange fruit, as insane. There is more to this universe then we can see; and those who see it? There are pills for that, there’s therapy, there’s a padded room with a bed.
Reality is just a set of ideas that a group of individuals have agreed on, and majority rules. Accept this. Now that we know this, how are we supposed to live in this world, knowing that we’re not really seeing any of it? All of this is just our interpretation of reality. What we see is just the brains interpretation of light waves, what we hear is just the brains interpretation of sound waves. It’s the brains best guess. Those pyjamas weren’t red, but they weren’t orange either, they could have been blue for all I really know. We can’t even scratch the surface of what our reality truly is, or can we?
Did you know the sun is green? Our eyes interpret the light as white, and the sun itself as a glowing yellow ball. The sun is green, you can see it by looking at plants, it has something to do with photosynthesis, plants taking energy from the sun. If the sun was truly yellow, plants would be too. Don’t believe me? Look it up, scientist know far more than I do, I just read their work.
The sky looks blue because of light passing through nitrogen particles. Our oceans look blue because of the absorption of longer wavelengths of light, and I should have played with dolls because I was born with a vagina and not a penis. Yeah, I’m still stuck on that.
Abstract art is the ultimate definition of the lack of reality, you can see whatever you want in it. I should have spent my years here studying abstract art instead of trying to find reality. Then again, how would I have reached this realisation without wasting all this time? How do we live in this world knowing this isn’t really it?
Scientists have discovered that the universe is beige. They thought it was green but apparently, it’s beige. Not black, like you’ve probably imagined, the vacuum of space and all that, but beige. That sounds right to me, that’s sounds true. The universe is the most boring colour imaginable, next to magnolia. I would have said grey, at least grey is a mixture of black and white which gives it some points.
I’ve been here for years, and what have I learnt? That I don’t want to live in a world knowing that I’m not seeing any of it. What we express to others is our interpretation of reality. What others express to us is theirs.
Whenever someone brings up ‘God’, I cringe a little inside. I feel their point might well be valid, but why bring ‘God’ into it? My interpretation of ‘God’ is not the same as other’s interpretations. Most interpretations of ‘God’ make me nauseous. Religion is an interpretation of reality. You choose which one to follow, or one is chosen for you. If you make the wrong choice, others will try to convert you to their choice. It seems a wild waste of energy, time and cognitive power, the sun is green, and the universe is beige after all. What’s true for one, is not true for all, what’s ‘real’, isn’t real.
I’ve been here for years, studying, learning, meditating, exploring. Searching. I’ve walked strange paths and tasted new foods, I’m not ready to leave this place yet, there’s still so much more. If you could leave this reality, where would you go? If you could create your own reality, what would you create? If you could make others see reality the way you see it, what would you make them see first? Is it red or is it orange? Does it even matter?
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