Tuesday, April 22, 2014

Natascha Kampusch in 2014

Back in 2006, I sat here in Germany and watched the Natascha Kampusch episode unfold in Austria.

Natascha had been grabbed off the street as a kid....kidnapped....and held for eight years by a guy in a simple neighborhood....pretending to be sane and normal, and just desiring some prisoner of sorts. In 2006, she finally escaped, and the guy committed suicide a few hours after the escape.

What she laid out was this lifestyle of containment as a kid.  Books and magazines were read.  Hours were spent listening to the radio.  From every aspect.....she was a prisoner.

What happened since 2006?  The London Daily Mail did a short update story this weekend over Natascha.  Basically.....she tried to get into an educational phase, and has kinda lost interest.  No real explanations but I would imagine she's not the type that really desires to sit in a room with twenty to forty students....listening to some lecture.

The driving class to get a license?  Well....the pressure and stress of an instructor is a bit too much for her there.  Here in Germany.....you only get the license after you've gone through twenty-odd hours of hands-on driving with some instructor sitting beside you and continually correcting your behavior, your mistakes, and your attitude.  I doubt if she has the stamina to sit there and allow some instructor into that type of confined area of a car for an hour.

Contact issues?  The London Daily Mail hints that she doesn't do contact with people that well.  She's an intensely private person.....by my reading of their account.  People ask questions.....people want to know how she feels....people try to put themselves into her position and discuss the matter....none of this really matters within the defined world of Natascha.

At the age of twenty-six....it's hard to say where this story goes.  Career work?  Ninety-eight percent of all jobs in the commercial world revolve around meeting people and working with a customer base.  I don't think she'll ever fit into any of those jobs.  From the remaining two percent?  Between anxiety, panic attacks and personal stress....a simple eight hour a day job would be absolute torture for her.  Toss in yearly evaluations or trainer-involvement.....it'll be near impossible for any long term job.

The other side of this story is that she is an extremely bright individual.....heavily focused on every single detail and event within close proximity of her.....probably calculating forty scenarios in her mind at any given time.  Trust and control in her mind?  It's measured in Planck length.  Planck length is the magnificent device that scientist Max Planck developed...giving the smallest possible way of measuring a defined object.

You can feel some pity for Natascha....along with some hope.  The trouble is that in her mind....it's one against a million, and trust will never resolve itself in any way of living a typically normal lifestyle.  I would imagine just going on a hike....would amount to walking with a seven-hundred pound gorilla next to you and the threat of a thunderstorm going from possibly maximum power to absolute maximum power.  Stopping for a burger at McDonalds?  It means human contact....questions asked (stupid questions I admit)....and unnecessary stress at having to deal with another person.

In a way, Natascha has exchanged prison version 1.0.....for prison version 2.0.  She's never free....just consumed with acting free and pretending to be marginally recovered.

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