The Tyranny of Habit

The girl had the peculiar habit of taking off her eyeglasses whenever she entered a room. The particles of dust on the carpet were too much for her to bear and the removal of her spectacles tended to demagnify the dirt.

She also had the habit of watching too closely, new acquaintances eat soup. If they added salt to the soup they hadn’t tasted, the girl could automatically dismiss them as an acquaintance because they started out with too many assumptions.

But the girl was not alone in her offbeat habits. Her sister seemed to get along swimmingly with the pigeons. She had adopted the habit of taking her violin along on her birdwatching treks and whenever she encountered a pigeon, she played passionate and melodic music with tears streaming down her face.

These bizarre habits had become a nuisance and the girl resolved that the will to make a habit is the same that is required to unmake it. That day she opted to undo her bad habits and naturally, her brother and sister followed suit.

Even the most responsible person may find that they have unconsciously formed a habit and have become a slave to it. Such was the case with her brother. He first dissected worms and frogs in the fulfillment of his high school science requirements. Since then, he had acquired the unusual habit of boiling frogs.

His ritual included capturing a frog and placing it in a cool pot of water, then placing the pot on an open flame. The temperature of the water would be gradually heated until it reached a feverish boil. He would never place the frog into water that was already boiling for fear the frog would jump out. Instead, he’d put the frog into tepid water so that it would not perceive the danger. He would then slowly bring the water to a boil, cooking the frog in its false comfort, until it dissolved, leaving nothing but bones floating to the top.

The girl bought a new car for their road trip. The siblings had agreed to spend their vacation driving to Wyoming to visit the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. It was a deep canyon that cut through the volcanic tuff of Yellowstone Park. The park itself was 8,000 feet above sea level on the site of a huge ancient volcano.

The girl’s brother was most interested in the hotspot that was called the “blue hole,” which was a deep hot spring that was in the shape of a perfect funnel. The water was a super-clear blue color with concentric rings of bright yellow and orange around the blue center.

The geothermal-heated water could reach temperatures in excess of 200o Fahrenheit. It was this precise fact that so interested the girl’s brother. His intention was to toss a frog into the water and observe to see whether the frog would dissolve, leaving only its tiny bones swirling in the hot spring funnel.

The girl parked her car in an unauthorized area near the Norris Geyser, which was the park’s hottest geyser basin, which spouted water more than 300 feet in the air. Her brother grabbed a frog and placed it in a bag. Then they headed back toward the car and to the blue hole to toss in the frog.

On their trek back to the car, the siblings frolicked, made gaiety and contemplated the tyranny of habits.

Then an illusion occurred before their eyes. A large recreational vehicle, which had been there moments ago, sank into the ground and disappeared.

Agreeing that they were experiencing a joint hallucination, they went closer to inspect the illusion when another vehicle sank into the ground and disappeared.

Disbelief struck!

Everything began to sink. The ground appeared to be on fire. No flames, just red ripples like charcoal on a bar-b-que grill.

They stifled.

Then the red ground advanced toward them and they ran. The walkways and the boardwalks sank into the ground.

They ran!

The earth was consumed behind them. They ran, trying to determine which direction to go. They headed toward a body of water. It began to boil and they ran the other way. They reached the clearing of trees, then the parking lot and their car. They looked back in astonishment at the hot molten rock left behind by the dormant volcanic activity.

The girl and her sister wanted nothing more than to get off the mountain and leave Yellowstone forever and a day. But their brother convinced them to stop at the blue hole so that he might complete his experiment.

He took the frog out of the bag and before throwing it in, reached down to check the temperature of the hot spring.

He slipped and fell into the water!

The girl was recording on her cell phone when he fell in but she couldn't save him because he sank directly into the funnel. The deep thermal water contained sulfuric acid that was produced by microorganisms in the rock and soil.

Their brother was dissolved in short order and his bones swirled to the top of the blue hole. The tiny frog hopped out of the bag, headed back to the woods, and disappeared into the forest of trees.