Editors’ Letter: July

illustrated by Kat Stroude

Last year, Matt Danzico conducted an experiment in which he tried to measure human perception of time. Really, even beginning to think about the construction of time is a crazy idea and Danzico’s plan kind of sounds like it was concocted in a smoky garden shed somewhere, amidst a haze of potato chips and six straight hours of Mystery Science Theatre 3000.

But actually, it was birthed out of a fear of getting old. His 30th birthday was rapidly approaching. And this scared the hell out of him.

Danzico’s essential question was: when you do new things, do you perceive them as happening more slowly than mundane things, because your brain has more information to process? And in turn, does this technically equal more life?

In order to test his theory, he decided to attempt one new thing every day, for a year. Some of these activities included: attempting a head spin; trying archery; going to a punk rock strip club; finding a spirit animal through a shaman ceremony; eating a burger with a homeless man (who proceeded to tell him about the time he emptied a hand gun into another man’s kidney).

All in all, it doesn’t seem like Danzico’s experiment proved much of anything, and his last year of being a twenty-something inevitably ended; but at least it was nowhere near mundane.

If you use Run! don’t Walk! editors’ letters as a demarcation of time, it would appear that May and June just didn’t exist. We must apologise for the neglect, for leaving you inside the hot, sweaty Subaru of the internet, whilst we were inside playing the pokies.

We’ll be honest and say that things have been a little draughty around these here parts lately. One of those periods when other things just seem to have got in the way. But as of now, we’re getting back on the publishing horse, as parched and feeble as she may be. You have our word.

It seems strange to realise another semester is down. Another half a year of life over. Maybe you spent it living; talking to dangerous homeless people and the like. Maybe you graduated uni and are staring down the barrel of fulltime employment. Or maybe you fucked up your last six months so royally you want to crawl up into a little ball of regret.

Either way, I think you’ll agree that now seems like a better time than any to run into the street, take off all your clothes, bust open a fire hydrant and yell something along the lines of “I’M A PHOENIX RISING FROM THE MUTHAHFUCKING ASHES, MUTHAFUCKER$!!!!” while the spurting water seeps into the pavement all around you.

Or maybe we’ll just mentally do that. Otherwise it’s back to the sanatorium for the both of us.

So here’s to new beginnings, to doing something you’re proud of, to having the balls to pick yourself back up again and to punk rock strip clubs.

We’ll see you on the other side,

Team Run! don’t Walk!

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