Houdini-Stylie

A magician has spent a week floating in a water-filled fishtank. Now he's trying to break the breath-holding record. He sits placidly underwater, eyelashes fluttering slightly; when he runs out of stamina, he starts burping out bubbles and two helpers in silver wetsuits flash into the tank. One flits to the bottom to free him from his chains. The job of the other one is to hold her hand over the magician's nose and mouth so he does not breathe in water. He's struggling to breathe in, in a blackout I hope, his lungs making him convulse with their need for air, and her job is to clamp her hand over his airways and hold him there. Torture. It's pure torture. I think, that cruel bitch. I know what's she's doing is necessary and helpful, the same way Temple Grandin's job is necessary and helpful, but I think, "What a cruel bitch." Because I know what it feels like to have someone clamp a hand over your airways, and I know what agony it is to convulse as your lungs beg for air.

I wonder if the water sometimes feels good, like someone curled around you in bed, on a "good day," when you weren't called a stupid cunt because you forgot your phone. I wonder if sometimes he wishes he'd never see water again. I wonder if I'm overdoing the metaphor.

I think, "People put themselves in all sorts of boxes." I think, "There's a reason people watch his stunts." I think, "If I could escape from this, I would have done more, quietly, without cheers from Fiona Apple and David Arquette, than he is doing." I don't fault him for doing something harder, but easier. I don't really think of him as inspiration, either. I just think: "People put themselves in all sorts of boxes. All sorts of fishtanks. All sorts of chains. People sit in all sorts of impossible, self-induced torment, and either they get out or they don't." He did. Will I?