Inertia and Inspiration

Maia Nunez

Motion sickness is a recent development for me. Perhaps it’s because I’m getting older, but I really can’t read in a moving vehicle anymore without a small wave of nausea sweeping over me. Long gone are the days when I could bring books on road trips or absentmindedly answer a throng of text messages on the subway. There is a science behind it, something about conflicting balance-sensing systems involving nerves, the eyes, the inner ear, and so on. However, you could easily look that up on your own. And I wouldn’t want to spew (no icky pun intended) anatomical facts at you. 

I’ll offer you a funny story instead. One of the worst instances of motion sickness I have ever experienced was back in 2018. My high school’s French club took a few of us on a trip to Montréal and one of the places we visited was the imposing Biodôme. It’s one of those science centers that has it all: an insectarium, gardens, and a planetarium among other neat components. Long story short, while watching one of those 360-degree mini-movies about the Big Bang and the Solar System, I thought I was going to be sick. To avoid doing so, I kept my eyes shut for the remainder of the presentation which is kind of sad because I wanted to witness all of what was presented to me. Frazzled (and a little disquieted), I ate a plain croissant afterward to ease my stomach and my head, contemplating my fleeting endurance, my waning vim and vigor. What an image that must have been to an onlooker. 

That little anecdote doesn’t appear to have much of a point to it, but I’m getting there. I promise. 

These days, the truth is I can barely tolerate anything too fast-paced. Even if I perform to the best of my ability and constantly enjoy having something productive or ‘worthwhile’ to do, I end up getting absolutely winded and burnt out. Basically, if I find myself with spare time, I feel obligated to devote it to something related to school or work. In a kind of Sisyphean manner, I’ve somehow deluded myself into believing that if I get all the upcoming tasks and projects done early, I can have more time left over to relax and all this hard work will pay off. At this point, my motto has become “I just need to make it through this week.”  

It’s a rarity to have me-time. To have a moment to stop, breathe, and smell the metaphorical roses. And when I do, I get anxious about being idle. On a semi-related note, boredom is also (initially) envisioned as a plague, of sorts. In those moments, nothing is more oppressive than ennui. Still, though, the incessant fretting over being productive and trying to stay afloat in a fast-paced environment can do a number on your body. Very recently in fact (on the eve of Spring Break), after a very stressful past few weeks, I was utterly humbled and brought to my knees by a ruptured cyst and some slight internal bleeding from that. Aside from feeling betrayed by my own body, I felt frustrated at my sudden incapacitated state — I didn’t have the energy to do anything productive! Or so I thought. 

I was gifted with a lot of time to think. In the humdrum of everyday life, it can be exhausting to come home from a long day and try to be creative, to make something for me. And so this one moment of stillness granted me the opportunity to think more about what I’d like to accomplish creatively over the next few months. I brainstormed some ideas about poetry anthologies, a novel, and just got to take in what was immediately in front of me and be happy about that. Name something more pleasing than toast with butter and orange marmalade. That’s right, you can’t. 

All this to say, silence can be uncomfortable because it’s so unfamiliar for a lot of us. But they’re right (whoever ‘they’ are) to say that it is golden. When you have spare time, when you are bored or worried about accomplishing some future task for the sake of being in control and productive, I’d encourage you to rest awhile and then think about what it is you’d like to do, what you’d like to create. Besides, our universe was once nothing until a big explosion came about. And I’m not going to subject myself to another planetarium’s revolving and nausea-inducing film to remember that!