780 – A Boy His Wagon

Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, and friends beyond the binary, it's time for the podcaster patrons that you support and hopefully… I don't support you, I get you room to sink in and get comfortable. I don't know. I support healthy sleep, and you support me. Thanks.

Hey, are you up all night tossing, turning, mind racing? Trouble getting to sleep? Trouble staying asleep? Well welcome, this is Sleep with Me, the podcast that puts you to sleep. We do the bedtime story. All you need to do is get in bed, turn out the lights, and press play. I'm going to do the rest. What I'm going to attempt to do is create a safe place where you could set aside whatever's keeping you awake, whether it's thoughts, feelings, physical sensations, changes in time or temperature, changes in your routine. Maybe you're traveling. Whatever's keeping you awake, I'd like to take your mind off of that, create a safe place to do so or level of trust where you let me do so.

And then what I'll do is I'll send my voice across the deep dark night. I'll use lulling, soothing, creaky, dulcet tones, pointless meanders, superfluous tangents, like extra words, misplaced words, concerns of mind that then I try to make more sleepy and dreamy. Because I was thinking about travel and then I said, “Oh, well, I had something I was thinking about.” And the whole idea is the podcast is here to keep you company while you drift off.

And now, if you're new, here's a couple of things. I'm glad you're here. How are you doing? You don't have to come on in. This is the kind of place in podcasts where, because they really don't like that. I don't know why. I mean, I did it because I said I wanted you to feel welcome. But I also want you to, here's a, is this a paradox? I want you to feel so welcome, you could feel unwelcome. You know what I'm saying? Like where you say, because I don't like it when I'm standing somewhere looking in at a distance and that's my, I say, “Well, this is my safe place. Outside your store looking in, seeing what you're up to and seeing what your angles are and trying to check if there's any funny business.”

So, then when you say, “Hey, I see you looking in the store. Come on in. The air's just fine in here.” I say, “Well, I'll be the judge of that, thank you.” Your friendly tone is doing nothing to earn my trust. And then sometimes the people won't get it and they'll say, “You'll get a lot better view from up close.” And I say, “I don't care if they call this Main Street, USA. It doesn't make me feel, that just like, it doesn't clarify my, it's going to take me a while.” In this podcast, I say, “You want to stay outside? Go right ahead.”

Like ideally that you could hear it wherever you are. I would say the air's just fine where you are, wherever you are. You want to come in? Come on in. You want to get a little bit closer and then you say, “Well, I prefer back.” I say, let me just shoot. You could look at me through opera glasses or a microscope or, and I don't know if you, I wonder what you'd see if you use an oscilloscope or whatever that thing is. You'd say, “Holy, who? I didn't even know this thing could pick up creaky dulcet tones. But you're off the charts and the creaky dulcet tones and pointless meanders.” And I'd say, “Excellent.” So if you… What was I saying? If you're new, I'm glad you're here. But if you don't buy that, that's great too.

Look seriously, if you're skeptical about this podcast, I totally understand. Just wait until I try to explain to you what it is. If you think you're skeptical now. So, what I mean, I would be skeptical. That's what I mean. Who says they're going to put you to sleep, right? They say, “Come on inside this mattress shop. We just want to get you settled in here.” You say, “No thanks, I got it covered on the Internet.”

So, oh what was my point? Oh there's a show that's a little like not, doesn't have a lot of points, but if you're new structurally what to expect, show starts off with a few minutes to business. You already heard that/ That's more for the regular listeners. That's how we keep the podcast free for everybody.

Then there's an intro, which is kind of a long, to some people it feels like a long drawn-out, a pointless description of the podcast and that's exactly kind of what it is. You caught me. Maybe then, that would be how maybe the shopkeeper would, I guess if they gave me space to wander in there, like eventually they could earn my trust and rapport. You just say, “Hey don't, what's the pressure to come in your store.” I mean I realize I just, and I said, “Well, I wasn't. I was just trying to be friendly.” And I'd say, “Right, I don't give friends for friendship.” I don't know how to, I live in a paradoxical world. I don't know. I don't even understand it.

You're not going to win any friends by being nice to me. Or you know the other way around either. Hopefully I would have an imaginary Nana with me who would say, “Oh don't pay him any mind, he doesn't.” And I say, “Right Nana.” Maybe this is where, maybe it hearkens back to you. Nana, did you ever run a shop before? I'll get back to the new listeners, oh, you're right Nana, I should get back to the new listeners. That's my Nana. She lives in my mind, always at every moment. “He's over exaggerating.” “I say, yep. You're right, Nana. Over exaggerating again.”

But so the intro is a long and, it's just like kind of a, I try to make a metaphor of what the podcast is. I never succeed. And in doing so, hopefully I put you to sleep. Or so some listeners for the intro, some listers fall asleep and some listeners skip the intro.

But for the majority of listeners, it's kind of part of their wind down routine. Like almost like watching someone else play a game that's relaxing. I don't know what that would be. And plus I have piled too many metaphors on already. I say yeah, Nana it got whatever other metaphor I was making that I forgot about and now I'm thinking of someone just using a yo-yo, I don't know. I've never watched someone use a yo-yo before because it's kind of rare in, I mean I again holy going off course, but the quality of yo-yos, the majority yo-yos distributed are not the greatest. They're usually giveaways, right? At a birthday party. So there are high quality yo-yos I think I may have owned one good, now I'm not a yo-yo, like now I'm thinking of Yo-Yo Ma.

So, this is kind of, this is like a little bit of a meta view. This is really what my mind just kind of naturally does. But I was going to say the most famous company I think is Dunkin that makes the good yo-yos. Also, there was a funny Simpsons episode about yo-yos. Also, now I think I've got like I'm stuck in a slippery part of my brain that just likes me saying yo-yo over, over again.

But if there was another world where a lot of people use yo-yos and they were skilled at it or, you don't have to be great, just moderately good at like flicking it down. Oh, what's a yo-yo? Sorry, it's like this thing. You could look it up on the, I'm sure someone's got a great YouTube channel where they do yo-yo. And as a matter of fact, if you want to do a crossover episode, that would be relaxing just to see, just to relaxing. But I was saying some listeners, the intro is like that for them, just watching a yo-yo go up and down.

And that's a pretty clear metaphor for a spinning its wheels too. And walking the dog. I've done, I think I did all those things in a central around the world. Oh boy. Did I go round, meandering around my world. And so that's the intro. Then there'll be a bedtime story, there's some business between the intro and the episode. Then there's a bedtime story. The intro is kind of like a bedtime story. It's kind of like if like a stealth one. Or it's a bedtime story, wind up and cool down, but then we'll have a bedtime story. It'll be trending Tuesday style. I don't know what it's going to be yet. And then at the end of the show we have thank yous and good nights. So social structure, the show, clearly, I think if you've been listening, you've probably figured out you don't really need to listen to this podcast to, you don't have to really pay attention to it.

Much like that yo-yo image, especially one that, I don't know if it'll say a ball bearings in them, the good ones, or if that's the company that makes them. I'm trying to think when in my life, I think I've had two good yo-yos, but I don't remember them. I mean, in the 80s there was like a yo-yo comeback, and I think that's what the Simpsons episode was about. If there was a butterfly yo-yo. I think I had one of those. And then later in life there was this series of books called the [inaudible 00:09:39] Books. And I'm not going to say they named him after me, but I should have been getting paid for that. I always think I had a Colachi yo-yo, but I think I had one of how to tie your shoes.

I don't know if that was actually a book, or they just said, “Let's just send this to scoots and see if it's marketable.” And then I was at the, it was actually at a bookstore, and I said, “I can't, my legs. I can't get my leg off this pole. I followed your tie the shoe book.” And they say, “You weren't supposed to lace the book to your shoes, Sir.” And I'd says, well it's about, and I said, “Really?” It's interesting, because there's shoelaces in this book. There's shoelaces in my shoes. Now they're one.” I guess I wasn't a Beta tester for that book. It just was looking in the bookstore until I was on, my shoe was on one side of the pole, book was on the other, shoelaces in bixtween. And I said “Can't do this on Amazon.” Holy cow. It actually felt good. It really felt like it stretched my foot out.

Anyway, I don't even know what I was trying to explain. Oh, I think I was talking about yo-yos and to just try to remember it, but at some point in my life I had another quality yo-yo. Very briefly, I mean here's, maybe this could be the episode tonight is, I don't think so, though. But I'm sure there's a lot of forgotten yo-yos out there. Maybe that could be, I mean, I don't, I guess you like, yeah, I mean maybe there could be a song about the forgotten yo-yos. I've just overused the word already tonight, so I can't make an episode about it. But, so anyway, make me messages. I'm glad you're here. But despite [inaudible 00:11:26] gets this goofy. You don't need to listen to it.

There's also no pressure to fall asleep. I'm here for about an hour to keep you company as you drift off at your leisure. I make this show because I believe you deserve a good night's sleep. And I want you to get it. Now this doesn't work for everybody. Give it a few tries, see if it helps you. But really, like yeah, I mean yeah, that's what I, I'm here to help. I'm here to keep your company as you drift off. I strive and I work very hard because I want to help you fall asleep. Thanks again for coming by. And here's a couple of ways we keep the show going.

All right, everybody. So, tonight's story, it's like a little bit of an exploratory story, and I guess I was saying, which story did I remember that I was going to tell tonight and it comes from an intro that came up at some point and I realized these characters really haven't come up in a while. Like so long ago that I barely remember them. There was a creators of the world, famous purple people circus, whose names escape me. The founders. It was two people, and as far as I know, so they founded this great circus. You probably, it doesn't have as much H-Y-P-E as some of the other circuses. And so you say, “I've never heard of the purple people circus.” And you say, “Well, one day you may, if you just happen to be at the right place at the right time in the right town square. And I think the last time we encountered it was when they discovered the Great Phil Fufushigi, who was one of their newest members.

So, that was a famous tale, and I think when they first met, the founding founders met via, what was it called? Not a mannequin's dummy. A ventriloquist dummy. And they fell in love and formed a Purple People Circus together. Great story. I don't know what episode it was or where it is, but it's somewhere in my brain has a recall of it. And the reason was because they said, “Oh, wait a second.” In the intro, I thought, like there was this other character they had added that, because they're always, they travel the world performing and then they check out the buskers, the street performers, the underground theaters of the world looking for the next thing and trying the thing.

And like, I knew about the season as a kid when I was a kid, and I said, “One day I'd like to be in the, if there's a circus called the Purple People Circus, I'd like to be a part of it, because it sounds very dreamy, purple.” And I said, “Would it be a purple top instead of a big top?” And they seem to be a big purple top. Yeah. Yeah. It would be.

But this is a tale of a boy that joined the circus. A boy in both a dilemma and in search of something. A tale of a boy in his wagon. And his cat, who his cat was named the Corrugator, of all things. And this boy, like an extra, like I say, he's a young man at the point where we catch him in the story, traveling the world with a little, like a red wagon, a wobbly, wiggidy wagon. And with his cat in there. And dancing. He was a break dancer, this young lad whose name I will one day learn. For one day, he went to a town square, and no one was there. Like he had traveled to the city and it was one of the great cities somewhere in Eastern Europe. And he actually was fluent in the language and you see, he traveled to the city center, like one of the square great squares of this city expecting to perform, but the square was empty. And it was, it was like one of those seasons where it wasn't a lot of tourists with this square, was presumably would've had people in it.

And so he checked his watch. Checked a choice. Had a chuckle, thinking about a Santa Claus checking a list, and realize, “Wait a second. It's like a prime milling about a square time.” Like it was a Saturday at 2:00 P.M. And the day was nice. It wasn't too warm. It wasn't too cold. It was just seasonably temperate. And so the boy said, “Corrugator, this is interesting. Where is everybody?” And then the boy got out his cardboard a that he used to do his break-dancing. And then he got out his boom box. And then he stretched. He would go through a routine of stretching. And he said, “Okay, well where is everybody?” Getting limbered up, getting ready for an audience, doing some basic break and moves. But moreso getting prepared for what was to come.

And so there's no one. Like even the pigeon population was only like three pigeons that flew by. And then the boy started to wonder like, this is something strange [inaudible 00:17:28]. Like, maybe I need to look about. And the boy kind of started to quiet the mind and the, quiet down to see like, can I hear anything? Can I sense anything? And the boy thought he heard some like a murmuring, like a crowd murmuring somewhere. And maybe because, “Well, I'm not familiar with this town. Maybe I picked the wrong square even though this is like the one that has the nice statues. And had benches. It had cafes. And the boy said, “Oh, wait a second. Even the cafes are closed. Maybe it's a holiday or something.”

And the boy he headed towards some murmuring. And as the boy headed towards the murmuring, went into a rich part of the town where you'd say, okay, this is the old town, right? This is not the new town. This is the older section of the town. Or that's what the tourists would say. “Oh, you're going to old town or new town?” And so streets got to be winding and the murmuring got a little more, like coalesced I guess you'd say.

And the boy kept going towards the murmuring and then stopped at the middle of the street, cobblestone street, as a matter of fact. And the boy realized the murmuring was nearby, but, couldn't tell if it was like a little to the left or the right. And then the boy realized, wait a second, the murmuring's coming from below my feet, is a murmuring of people, in like a crack, like a calm murmuring. Kind of like the sound when people are waiting around for something to start.

And he thought that was interesting. So then he like looked around and then he went down the side of this one building and realized that there was a courtyard and a set of stairs leading down on the side of the courtyard. And so the boy headed down the stairs. Again, it was a warm calming, murmuring, nothing, the boy was like, “Okay. I'm going for it. It totally sounds like a great, like whatever they're murmuring about, it's like a murmur of an chill anticipation. And then the boy realized, “Well I'd better bring my wagon just in case, because I don't, and of course Corrugator.” And then the boy realized, “Oh, wait a second. I have like.”

So, then boy ran all the way back to the town square. He got the corrugated cardboard, the boombox and the cat named the Corrugator, and said, “Good job, Corrugator, keeping an eye on everything. Sorry. I just was checking out that murmuring.” And the Corrugator, the cat stretched and, well put its head down on the corrugated cardboard. And also good because it's just sharp. It has a sweatshirt. So, Corrugator the cat curled up in the sweatshirt and went to sleep. Now meanwhile the boy in his wiggedy wiggedy wagon, if you ever seen like a wobbly wiggedy wagon and a cobblestone street, it's almost like where one vibration vibrates another way. Like it was almost like they were made for one another. So instead of wobbling, the wagon went along, quite, it was almost like a anticipation, the wobbles in the cobbles fit togethe.r. and the boy said, “That's interesting.”

And I think Corrugator the cat who said, Huh, this is weird. Like usually this wagon's a lot more wobbly. So, Corrugator wasn't actually asleep even though if you looked at the Corrugator you'd say, certainly it looks like that cat's asleep. I could tell you that the Corrugator was taking everything, as cats are known to do. Because they're so wise, because they love sleep podcasters so much who appreciate their wisdom. That's why. Of course, every cat knows that, and how wise they are. Even when they're being pandered to. they appreciate it.

And the Corrugator then, as they wobbled down the cobbles, the Corrugator put its head up and said, “Mmm'am.” Like huh, like because Corrugator had noticed the murmuring as well. And this young person, this young man, we'll call Zeke for now, as Zeke swept up the wiggedy wagon with, I put it on the wagon and it's, his hip, and headed down the stairs, towards the murmuring and got to the bottom of the stairs. And there was a gate there, and the boy opened the gates and led into like a beautiful part of the old city.

And what the boy didn't realize was like this was a, like as soon as the boy went through the gate, into these like vaulted, this vaulted underground that, there was candle lights and it just happened to be like a special night. [inaudible 00:23:19] so, oh, this is why, everybody in the town is down in the underground. And there was there was a little bit of natural light filtering in, but then there was candles. There was also the LED candles. And everything gave it this warm element, the, those vaulted brick ceilings you see. Really like something that would be romanticized if Zeke wasn't really there in person.

And oh boy did the Corrugator like this because it was just warm. It didn't seem like, it was a cat's, like not to say was the cat's pajamas, but they're not a lot of like sub terrainian sub city levels that, I mean, I'm just telling you from experience. And you might say, well, like Zeke was a like a busker cat. Or not Zeke. The Corrugator. And Zeke did call Corrugator the Corg or Cor. Yeah. I don't know how to spell Corrugator, so. I think that's what he would say. Or like because for a while did call it Corgi, but that was too confusing for people that had that kind of dog. They said, that's a cat.

Then Zeke started calling the Corrugator Corg and then Zeke started to follow again as the murmuring, and quickly saw, like I said a crowd was gathered there. And they were murmuring in anticipation. People were kind of talking. And because if they think of like the ceilings were vaulted but they weren't super high. And because of the low light, no one was like, everyone had a modulated tone [inaudible 00:25:13]. That sounded like the, that's what the murmuring was like. [inaudible 00:25:17]. At a distance you say, “That's some good murmuring. Got to get that on a loop to sleep too.” And indistinct murmuring. Still at a distance. Well, sometimes it's hard to hear stuff because the wiggedy wiggedy wagon that wobbles, it can make a lot of racket.

And it's just strange that a cat, Corg could just sleep through all that racket. And despite how calm everything was, there was some of that struck Zeke and Corg even. It's just strange that everybody's still just milling around and people have looked over at the two of them. And then Zeke kind of found a nice little alcove to park the wagon and Corg, Corrugator and made a little like took a jacket and, or sweatshirt and made it into more of a nest. And then Corg the Corrugator did some impressive stretching and walking around the wagon just to establish, like a cat like dominance in case anyone was watching. With a, let's do that cool confidence cats have. Because cats they're cool and they're confident. They're cats.

Even when people are allergic to cats, they could appreciate how you like, that situation. They can establish a subtle, with just your body movements in the way they move their bodies. I realized that sometimes I say repeat myself. Two cats. I know. That they can set the tone. Say this is my wagon and my friend's wagon. It might be a wiggedy wobbly wagon, but it's ours and I'm going to be resting in here. I just demonstrated my limberness and now I'm going to go into such a deep sleep because I'm so confident. I've made that clear. So, stay out of the wagon zone. I know you will. And so that was impressive.

But to Zeke, Zeke was still like, “What's going on?” And then finally Zeke went up to a woman and said, “What's going on here? What's, so, nobody's around.” And they said, “Oh, we're waiting to be entertained.” And Zeke said, “Huh, that's interesting. What time's the show start?” And the person kind of didn't seem to hear them. And Zeke said, “Well, something's amiss here. Wherever we are, whatever town we're in, something is, it seems to be,” I don't know if it's amiss or remiss. I think remiss. I think Zeke said to Zeke's self, “It'd be remiss if I didn't do something or get to the bottom of this.”

Plus like from a common sense perspective, from a busker's perspective, travel to this city or town hoping to make enough money to travel on. So, these could be my customers, Also presuming everybody in town's in here, the trains probably aren't traveling on time. And so make the most of it, I guess it would be the summary, what went through Zeke's mind.

And what Zeke did is just to sit down actually on the wagon next to the Corrugator up against this wall, boombox in Zeke's the lap, oh, boom box, you're right. Thanks, kids. It's a, it's like a big thing with two speakers to play music, usually via the radio or a cassette tape player. Though boomboxes do also have like a [inaudible 00:29:34] and stuff. And so, Zeke sat there and it felt like something about maybe the travel, the candle light, the relaxedness of the Corrugator, the comfort of the wagon leaning up against ancient bricks below the town, and again, all that murmuring, Zeke kind of dozed off for a while.

But then what was even, like, I guess a less wild, what could get less wild than that is that Zeke woke up later. Everything was still the same. People were still milling about and still murmuring, and nothing had happened. But again, everything seemed so relaxed, too. So, [inaudible 00:30:31] Zeke's still talking about different TV shows where stuff like this happened and Zeke said, “Well, none of that seemed as relaxed as this.” So relaxed the Corrugator's still asleep and I'm still asleep. And then Zeke said, “Well, let's just check in here.” And so Zeke went off to another person and said, “Hey, what are you waiting for?” And they said, “We're waiting to be entertained.” And Zeke said, “Okay, how am I going to get to the bottom of this? I mean I think I need to entertain.” And then Zeke said, “And maybe use my entertainment to uncover what's happening here in town.”

And so Zeke went back to the wagon and kind of were picked up the corrugated cardboard and the Corrugator who looked up at Zeke and then went back to sleep, or so we're led to suppose. Because sometimes we can't tell whether your cat's like, you really do have, I know they talk about nine lives. But I, what I appreciate is your sixth and seventh senses and the fact that you have readily accept apologies from people. And I say, well, it could be, I could have been nicer to cats and I have been pretty nice. So, there was one time I was nice when that cat sneezed in my mouth. Remember that? That was my sister's cat. Sat on my chest, sneezed in my mouth.

So, Zeke looked around this vaulted area and tried to find a place like, that seemed like a center stage. And actually there was this like raised alcove with a high ceiling, like kind of like a, I don't know, like it just a perfect spot to get everybody's attention. And Zeke does that in a like very like subtle away. Like put a cardboard down, walk all the way back across the rooms to the wagon. Went and got the boom box Again, everybody was murmuring but now they're murmuring, like “Oh boy. Stage is getting set up here.” And then Zeke got candles and just like it was the old theater, put the candles at the front of the stage. At some point the Corrugator hopped down and walked across the rooms and then hopped to the backstage left. Curled up in the corner.

And then Zeke started stretching a bit in front of the stage. Not on the stage. Not on the cardboard and doing some pacing and like getting ready. But at the same time like watching the room saying, “Huh. Again, everybody's just waiting to be entertained. I don't get it.” And like, no Zeke had studied a lot. Since he was a lad or a young boy to being, I guess a young man. Had worked and talked to other buskers and studied buskers and all those things. And Zeke had learned a lot from mimes and musicians and people that do pantomime. I don't know if that's different than mimes. But so many things.

So it was, Zeke kind of was doing some miming, like making sure everything was right to kind of build up anticipation and like get him ready. And then Zeke got up on stage, like Zeke was going to do something. But then Zeke put his fingers to his lips and said, “Huh.” And then got back down. And then when that happened, everybody turned and was facing the stage and starting to gather closer in. And then Zeke said, “Uh huh.” Like checking everything. Hopped on stage and said, “Okay, everybody, I hope you're ready to be entertained. And tonight's entertainment.” Because now it was a night. It had been the middle of Saturday afternoon, now it's Saturday night.

Zeke said, “Tonight's entertainment will consists of one of two performances. I'm trying to decide which one to perform. Because only I can do one.”

And then people said, “Oh.” And Zeke said, “I could either do the Skeptic's Dilemma or The Boy That Found His Hips.” And everyone looked at each other quizzically because neither of those titles was immediately grasping. But, and the idea that they would only get one was also like, made it even more of a thought moment. And somebody said, “Did he say Skemdick's dilemma? Dem Dick's Salama? They said, “No. Skeptic's Dilemma. Oh, what was the other one again? A Boy and His Hips, I think.” Oh remember like, and then Zeke said, “Okay, okay, I'll find a way to deliver both.” And then there was a smattering of applause as Zeke prepared to perform, and did the whole thing of like stretching again and cracking knuckles. Or just stretching the fingers. And then Zeke said, “Okay, well what kind of music should we play here?”

And again, I don't know the mechanics of this boom box. So, I don't know if it's mixed tapes or it was actually a digital boombox that looked like a mechanical one. But Zeke hit a button and it just laid down like a nice, like a down beat, or whatever. Just a nice loop. It just set the tone. And Zeke said, “Well, just once upon a time I'll tell you a story, in dance. It's about a boy that never believed in hips before.”

And the people even shouted at the ridiculousness of a boy that didn't believe in hips. And it was, Zeke said, “Okay,” and Zeke started doing a little bit of walk dancing and, I guess I should probably now try to capture what Zeke was actually doing, but with what the story Zeke was conveying. Since I'm not a dancer per se, it's tough for me to like quantify the moves. But we'll just say there were so transcendent that the dance became enveloped in story in a way that even the audience, I don't know if they were aware of that Zeke was even dancing, to be honest with you. Or they were so swept over the moment. But Zeke was moving. Zeke was dancing. You could say at moments that Zeke was grooving.

But Zeke told the tale, started out and said, “Well, long ago, there was a boy. And the boy like, grew up learning to question everything and questioning why is this or why is that? And as the boy even grew more. And they said, “Who would teach a boy this?” And he said, it was a teaching of the kingdom. It was a kingdom of a skeptic, a skeptopia that was called.

And this was a new show. Zeke was trying to make it, I mean, I'll just give you like a meta moment. Zeke was really trying to get to the bottom of what was happening here in this moment. But Zeke said, “Oh yeah, he was raised in Skiptopia and like to question everything and to counter everything. So, if someone said something, sometimes you should just take a counter position. The whole skeptical thing.

This was all one through dance too, and showing like, the queen of Skiptopia. The patriarch of, the post patriarch moments of Skiptopia. The whole history, everything. And all coming back to this boy learning about being a resident of Skiptopia. But there was one thing Zeke said those different about this boy. And then Zeke said, one day, because you couldn't just live in a isolated city state the boy had to travel with his aunt who owned like a, what do you call those things? A fabric business, bolts of fabric. And she was a merchant, a fabric merchant. And the boy said, “I went to this town. I know we're supposed to, like our trips to other places were supposed to reinforce her skepticism. And so my aunt constantly told me to be, all the reasons to reinforce my skepticism.”

But the boy said, “One time when I was sitting in the wagon waiting for her to complete a purchase, across the town square, I saw a dancer dancing and moving.” Well, and Zeke started doing these wild moves, both full body like waves and gyrations and also a dance of Zeke being enthralled with the dancing. Maybe even, some, whatever you call that, when it's your flowering inside, too. You say, what would this? This dance is making me feel something. And it was like a dance that involved a lot of like, and then there was a dance partner. And I have no like a Bachata. I don't dance that, but. Or Lambada was originally like a, but it was a very like when the two partners, like it was a whole story. Zeke was just trying to piece it together. And like Zeke said, and then we headed back to Skiptopia. And Zeke found that, was trying to recreate all these moves. And then Zeke was due, like a guy discovered the next day dancing with a broom and attempting some of these dance moves.

And it was, it became a bit of a to do around town because they like, everybody was always keeping an eye on everybody else because everybody was so skeptical because they said, “Well it's, you should be skeptical. Stay skeptical.” And they said, “Well Zeke, what are you doing?” Zeke said, “Dancing.” No, they had dance there. It was just not super interesting. Not like, like it was it just dances about, you don't fit the theme of that era. And that kind of was too much of a think piece, too for the audience. And so, Zeke did a dance for that. And whatever they said. You can't dance like that.

And at first it became this sort of theme for the stage in Zeke's life. Or the, I don't know. I'm getting my characters, so transcendent, Zeke's performance. But so this character's life. And it was just struggle against the parents in the society, because Zeke wanted to do that non skeptical dance, like dance about feelings and dances about unknown inquiries and curiosity and curious, and all those things. Not just one of those things.

And so the count. Everybody met, because this was like, just like in these type of stories, like the adults said, “what are we going to do about this? Because other kids are going to learn about it.” And they said, they called the town elders and they said, “Okay, what are we going to do? We got to get like either like, they said, “Well maybe Zeke could go, we could send Zeke, or the boy on a journey.” And I guess this sort of maybe was Zeke's story. But it was just that, the things are so close together.

And so they said, “No, no, no we can't. We can't. We got to do something.” And then they said, “What about?” And then someone said, “We're facing the skeptic's dilemma.” And someone said, “What is it?” And they said, “Only the keepers of the skepticism, the greatest secrets of skepticism can know what the skeptic's dilemma is.” And then they huddled these, these village elders and said, “What are you going to do about this kid and the dancing?” And one wise, I mean wise in this situation, I mean wisdom for good, said, “Well, I notice he doesn't move his hips very much. Probably because of like, all these ideas we planted in his head. So if we could just, if we could bring him in and make him forget about his hips, he'll never fully flourish as a dancer. Then we could send them out in the world with with no knowledge of his hips. Because we'll use a great, techniques. We'll convince him. He has no hips. And send him out in the world as a dancer then, and he'll return to us, even more skeptical than before.”

And some people were really starting to get into this, because it wasn't like Zeke was sitting there telling a meandering story. Zeke was dancing, Corrugator was watching Zeke and moving around sometimes, and once took a bath, a cat bath. So, everybody was entertained by this. And then Zeke said, “Okay, I got to take a water break here. We take five and when we get back to the dancing. But everybody stay close to the stage, because I want to get, this is a part of the show.”

And so some people went off, but for the most part people stayed around and said, “Wow, we should have like, and it's interesting.” And Zeke says, “So, is everybody finding themselves entertained?” And everybody said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” And Zeke said, “Geez, if I was a skeptic like the kid in the story, I'd wonder what everybody was doing down here, just waiting to be entertained, instead of up in there. I mean, this is beautiful down here. Don't get me wrong. And being entertained down here seems mighty nice.” But, got that town square there and probably people like, Zeke said, “Is this like a scheduled thing?”

And the people said, “We don't know. Like we we're just, we just know we're all down here waiting to be entertained.” And Zeke said, “Interesting. Interesting. Interesting. Okay.” And again, there's something that Zeke couldn't shake. But that was slowly cracking itself like an egg within, with inside of Zeke. Or peeling itself. Like a self-peeling onion layer after layer peeled by the subconscious of, whatever.

So, Zeke hopped back on stage and returned to the dance, but soon realized that something greater was happening. The reason a storyteller was so confused sometimes was because not only were the, what was so interesting watching, and just wondering if any cats were listening. If, the podcast was also Mmm'amm, meow. Like if they knew that they were just as important tonight, for tonight's episode.

We're always, of course, the greatest, plain and simple. But Zeke had realized, and Zeke had saw something in the eyes of the Corrugator. Because the Corrugator was so like clearly, where cat with wisdom, maybe more, we don't know. But Zeke said, “I'm going to get back to my dance.” And Zeke kind of showed through the next round of the story, how the boy started to go out in the world and dance without his hips, without a knowledge of his hips. And how that wasn't easy. Then added this extra, whew boy, I mean, talk about not easy, not just with dancing. With walking. And with finding whatever, I think it was a chakra down there also is related to the hips.

So, it was the life of a dancing boy doth led, until one day this boy, and Zeke kind of showed this, met this cat, a cat named, without a name at the time. And the cat was watching a set of dancers in a town Zeke had only planned on being in for a little while, or the boy. And these were break dancers. It was B girls and a B boy breaking it up. I mean, breaking it down. And Zeke just watched mesmerized next to this cat and like it was, then again, Zeke went back to where he was crashing, and the cat followed him. And Zeke was like, “Well, there's was a lot of moves.” Because, now Zeke had overcome a lot by learning to dance without the hips and becoming a dancing busker. Again, a story for another time.

Mostly like a lot of Zeke's early work, or this boy's work was a mechanical soldier. Tin person. Robot. A wooden puppet, Pinocchio style. Like hip less dancing. But Zeke was just so mesmerized by some of these, and maybe it was because it was like B boys and B girls. Like, that there was this other element, drawings, [inaudible 00:50:21]. But then, this was like where Zeke felt a little bit down. And then Zeke said, “Wait a second. My hips, I don't know like,” and then the, what they taught him, what they tried to engrain in Zeke, this boy, the kid, the dancer, this is all again on stage happening. Like it was a realization. “Oh, they don't want me to know my hips. So, I'm going to work harder to discover my hips.”

And Zeke started actually studying the movement of the cat, like of Corrugator, and of other people walking, other people dancing, just watching their hips at a distance, or distance, and slowly this is over, like again, in this happened on the stage. And again, this audience didn't care because they were like, they were in it, like whether this is 12-hour performance or not of Zeke slowly learning to move in and, shake, twist, move your hips at all as a part of a dance.

And so that was demonstrated. And then like a trigger to release a joy, a fullness, a complete dancing, or now break-dancing. But all the dances, even like elements of Bachata were all unlocked for Zeke. And also a friendship was formed with the Corrugator. But also something else, like is then now that this boy knew his hips and then eventually found a wickedy wickedy wagon. There was also something that by, a freeing Zeke's hips or the boy's hips. Zeke said to the audience, “And then I found myself here in this town square, not far away. And at first, I just thought, this is where the town square is, not far from the old town and the new town. This is where the people would be gathered to watch a busker. Why was it so easy for me to find it? Why was it so natural for me to just go there? Why did my hips lead me here?”

And everyone didn't know except for Zeke and the Corrugator, why. And then Zeke said, “And then I thought about that term, the skeptic's dilemma. For me it was the dilemma. You could be skeptical, but you can't be fully skeptical and know your hips in order to unlock them, the, those, the move. You have to at least set some of that skepticism aside. But the dilemma is that sometimes you end up.

And then it was just slow dawning.” Zeke didn't have to say it. People started to get, they started to say, “What are we doing? How long have you been down here? Like what, we've just been down here waiting to be entertained. Aren't we supposed to be doing other stuff?” And people started to remember, “Oh well, I got,” I said, “Well, I'm not sure about the weather. Well, we could go around down below the city and just wait to be entertained.” Well, I'm not sure about [inaudible 00:54:04].” Well, we could shut down the train system and then go down and below.

And then Zeke started to realize that they could all perform together, and Zeke started to teach them this dance called the Skeptic's Dilemma, which is, hip-based, a dance where your hips are, like some hip thrusting and some hip tilting, to just shake yourself free from this like a full skepticism. [inaudible 00:54:42], it's okay to have a healthy skepticism if this dance would indicate.

And eventually Zeke realized that this was a town I, this is where I grew up. I'd almost forgotten about it. And now I, I've like discovered a new level of it, and everybody likes it. Oh yeah. You were the kid that liked the dancing. And we tried to get the, like and they said, “The town elders are the ones that told us to go down here.” And eventually what Zeke realized is I mean is just move on because, then I said, “Well, we like your idea of freeing everyone from the skeptic's dilemma. And Zeke said, “Know what, I'm just going to hop on the next train. Now that you've started the trains again at least. And maybe one day I'll make my way back here with another dance.”

Slightly less skeptical dilemma. And that was when Zeke went to the next town after that, realized that two other people had wandered in that town, the founders of the Purple People Circus and then they caught Zeke's show which had a new level of passion and presentness and connection with the audience. And more and more stories, because it was real and authentic. And Zeke knew, I have to use my hips. I have to use my dance, my break dancing and more to pull these, make sure these people don't end up in the skeptic's dilemma, even though it's not totally, clearly defined exactly what it is, I can help them with my performing.

And if the people from Purple People Circus say we'd love for you to join us. It's kind of what we do, too. We're trying to get joy and surprise and fun and entertainment. And Zeke's joined them. And that's kind of like, another coming to a town near you one day maybe.

So, that's it. That's the tale of a boy and his wiggedy wiggedy wagon, his cat named the Corrugator. How I guess how he found his, rediscovered his hips and overcame the skeptic's dilemma. Good night.