"Naked and Afraid - Part Deux"

Hello Fellow Travelers!

 

Fairly recently (yesterday, if you must know) I was forced to watch a particularly painful looking episode of “N & A” on the “Discovery” Channel.  I say “particularly” because these “survivors’ put “being naked” in front of cameras (essentially, the world) at about #20 on their “Very  Short List of Things to be Concerned With” List, right around ketchup (As in:  Condiments that might allow me to keep these snake guts I’ve just eaten, down and not upchuck them again!) but way ahead of, say, napkin rings.  Before and after the contestants are “N & A’' they get their ‘'Personal Survivor Rating” calculated, (PSR) being survivor ready looks like really hard, cold, hungry work!  So watching that particularly grim hour of “Discover” (Discover exactly  what, anyway?  “Ancient Aliens”?  Dirt?  “Ancient Aliens in the Dirt”?)  So, “Naked and Afraid” taken at face value is really the same show repeated over and over.

 

What I consider a huge waste of natural resources others seek out as some kind of test – of their survivor skills.  These people train all year long to be “N & A”!  If you’re “N & A”, that tells me you’ve been everywhere and you’ve done everything, you’re “The World’s Most Interesting Man” (Or woman).  When you’ve done everything, bought or rented everything there is to rent or buy on the planet, are burning C-notes to light Cuban cigars then and only then do you answer whatever demon compels you to cross the globe to be freezing and starving for three weeks!  And have it filmed.  Or you’d drink a lot of “Dos Equis!”  And have that filmed!

 

Cancer revisits a lot of “What Would I Do?” terrain.  And a lot of what I wouldn’t do.  Top of the list?  I probably wouldn’t be too concerned with my PSR!  Nope.  Not too worked up about that.

 

Once you’ve “looked down the road of life”, finding out how well you would do in a catastrophe seems at best, irrelevant.   I met the Grim Reaper and he didn’t point out my death date or tell me to eat my vegetables or anything as easy a that.  Instead, it scared me beyond belief and empowered me to get moving again in the right direction.

 

Nudity is not really scary although nudists are unusual! (I mean have you seen a nudist camp? Sheesh!  Oh, the humanity!)

 

Death is scary!    And once you’re aware of it’s presence you’re always looking for it, and it comes too soon for everyone, But it always comes.

 

So the “N & A” franchise still gets my vote for “The Most Annoying and Most Copied Gimmick” on TV, but scary?  No.  Not even a little

 

I’ve seen the real deal and it stops your breath and turns your hair white.  Everything that’s supposed to frighten you, doesn’t have any ability to do so anymore.  You find your strength and your voice and “man (or woman) up”.