{"id":195,"date":"2003-02-25T17:21:54","date_gmt":"2003-02-25T17:21:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/2003\/02\/25\/my-death-as-a-stooge\/"},"modified":"2017-10-31T12:10:04","modified_gmt":"2017-10-31T16:10:04","slug":"my-death-as-a-stooge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/2003\/02\/25\/my-death-as-a-stooge\/","title":{"rendered":"MY DEATH AS A STOOGE"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the summer before I left for college, I was a “tech” for a summer stock production of Jesus Christ Superstar<\/em>. I was helping to build the set on an outdoor stage. Because “Jesus” had to be lifted into the sky on a hydraulic lift at the end of the play, the set was high. Since I have absolutely no fear of heights (in fact, I have whatever may be called the opposite of acrophobia … acrophelia<\/em>?), I was tasked with going out on a long wooden plank suspended between two very tall scaffolds in order to string heavy electrical cable along a steel bar that holds klieg lights. I was VERY HIGH UP!, and much too young too think about how short my life could be.<\/p>\n

I was not quite halfway across when suddenly I heard a CRASH!<\/em> and I looked over to see that the electrical cable was snapping free of its moorings. SNAP!, CRASH!, SNAP!, CRASH!<\/em>, it was detaching along the bar and heading toward me at a very fast speed. Imagine a one-inch thick black snake whipping toward you while you are balanced on 12-inches of wood. I couldn’t grab it, it was too heavy and moving too fast, and if I didn’t get out of the way it would wrap itself around me and pull me down to the stage below. As I have mentioned before, I was VERY HIGH UP! and the stage was very far down. Simply put, if I didn’t move my ass, I was going to die!<\/p>\n

The other scaffold was 25 to 30 feet away in the other direction. I had to move fast, but not too fast because, as I cannot stress enough, I was VERY HIGH UP!, moving along a wooden plank, while black death chased me along a narrow path. I couldn’t really run, I just had to WALK REALLY FAST!, sticking my arms straight out on either side for balance and rushing to the opposite scaffold like a rookie pilot trying to land an airplane.<\/p>\n

This all happened very rapidly, and it was only my youth and strength that allowed me to react and move so quickly. In my young life, I had probably never been closer to death, which utterly fails to explain why, as I was hustling as rapidly as possible away from a large black snake that wanted to pull me to my mortal end, VERY HIGH UP!, both arms sticking straight out like an airplane, my certain demise mere seconds away, that I began whooping like Curly from the Three Stooges<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"curly.jpg\"“Whoop-oop-oop-oop-oop! Whoop-oop-oop-oop-oop!<\/em>“. My fellow theater tech, safely ensconced on the scaffold towards which I was rushing, did not see the cable chasing me. He saw only a young man apparently taken mad, running toward him from VERY HIGH UP!, both arms stuck straight out and whooping like a loony bird. Honestly, I think he was more frightened than I was.<\/p>\n

Against all odds, I made it to the other side before the cable could get me. I hope never to have to stare death so squarely in the eye again, but if I do, I hope I can face it with similar collected calm and a clear sense of silliness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the summer before I left for college, I was a “tech” for a summer stock production of Jesus Christ Superstar. I was helping to build the set on an outdoor stage. Because “Jesus” had to be lifted into the sky on a hydraulic lift at the end of the play, the set was high. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-semi-biographical"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4E3H-39","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=195"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":515,"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195\/revisions\/515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/semitrue.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}