Crash

It's the sense of touch. In any real city, you walk, you know? You brush past people, people bump into you. In L.A., nobody touches you. We're always behind this metal and glass. I think we miss that touch so much, that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something.

I really believe this.

These days we constantly invent new ways to avoid each other. Email, instant messaging. Text messaging. I'm the first one to say that yeah, I am guilty of it, that I prefer this habit of evading. Really dealing with people is a pain in the ass. Nurses, teachers, customer service people...they know all too well what we're working day in and day out to avoid.

But then there are some people who pull you back in. They reach out and grab you from the comfortable, disconnected atmosphere you've been floating around in and yank you back to life. Real life. Not the one you watch on TV. Not the disembodied form lettered voice you read on the internet.

These people notice you. They look into your eyes. They ask questions. They tug at those dorment emotions inside your chest. It's like coming up for air when you've been stuck under the surface for too long.

This morning on my way to work I started to think. All those faces I pass in oncoming cars, do they wonder who I am as much as I wonder about them?

And all at once there it is, the gentle, rolling warmth that the human connection brings.

I find myself lingering over the toll worker's mittened hand when I relinquish my change. Smiling longer at the girl in the brown coat I walk past on the sidewalk. Caring more for the old man struggling to get on the bus with his grocery bags.

That's the thing. We're all in this together. We're all human, and pretty soon we'll get it right. Or else, we'll just crash.

Old Habits Die Hard

Across a smoky, crowded bar you shouted that I broke your heart. I yelled something back equally sad and hurtful, maybe even found my hands reaching toward your chest to push you away. Over and over we recall the tragic story of us, like the drone of the indifferent voice coming out of a dead telephone line, "...If you'd like to make a call, please hang up and dial again..."

Because in my head there's an airport terminal that flies away those dangerous thoughts every hour on the hour. Off to destinations more habitable. Cruising at thirty-five thousand feet through the mist and fog are those unsettling thoughts. Those tempting notions that someday we'll finally forgive each other for this scar, that wound, those heartbreaks. That we will one day stop fighting the pull of something we can't control.

And I count on it every night, that vital red eye.

Because I know that on my own, I won't be able to hang up that telephone.

Name my Dodgeball Team

I need ideas for a dodgeball team we're starting in a month.

Throw some at me.

A few things I've learned...

...in the last twenty-eight years.

Say please and thank you, even to strangers.

Don't scrimp on car or renter's insurance. Get full coverage.

If a family member needs you, you go.

Kindness will always get you further than cruelty.

If it's important, send it certified US Mail.

Anything work related can wait.

Look at people when they talk to you.

Respect other people's boundaries, even if you don't share them.

You teach people how to treat you. Teach them to treat you fairly and with respect or no one else will.

Call ahead before you fly.

Everything has a silver lining and if it doesn't, make your own.

Fake it 'til you make it, baby.

Do not grocery shop on Sundays. The stores are way too crowded.

There is absolutely no reason to be purposefully mean to anyone.

Excuses are unnacceptable.

Don't wait for people to change. Move on. They'll come with you or they won't.

Happiness is a choice.

Always let your cookies cool for five minutes on a cookie sheet before moving them to a rack.

Back up your hard drive every three months.

Yelling or screaming is not cool. Or necessary.

When people show you who they are, believe them.

Voting is a priviledge AND a right.

There are two types of people in the world: those who send thank you cards and those who don't.

You don't have to use a baby voice to talk to a toddler.

Invest the max percent of your paycheck into your 401k as soon as you enroll. Especially if your company will match it.

There is always a way.

Have an opinion, but don't offer it unless you are asked for it. Especially about politics.

Read every day. Your vocabulary will double as you see words used in context.

There you have it. That's one thing I've learned for every year I've been on this earth.

Please feel free to share your wisdom, too.

How did this happen?

He is the hulking anchor to my wandering boat, always pulling the sea of possibilities to me when I would rather sail away.

He's the whisper at my shoulder in the middle of the night that turns the corners of my mouth up into a sleepy smile.

He's feverish and exacting with his saving of me. Calculating and determined in the wordless way he halts my uncertainty before it ever even reaches my lips.

His smile opens roses. My heart.

I am needed more than necessary and I like it.

He is the effortless to my demanding. Unruffled to my frenetic. Happy to my sad. Love to my lonely.

And he offered me no choice.

Can I get an amen?

Today has already been an inexplicably boring day and it’s not even three o'clock yet. It's raining and all day yesterday my Thursday felt like a Friday, so I don't even have that great, it's Friday thing going on for me. I had a dream last night that I was cheated on, so I woke up in a bad mood and defeated anyways. The drive to work was just stupid. I’m an English major and honestly, that’s the best way I can describe it. So I guess this means only one thing…yep, a post on religion.

I grew up with religion, though not in a very strict sense. It was always there, like a benchwarmer for me, waiting to get in the big game. As of yet, I haven’t had much use for it, though I can’t say for sure I never will. I was confirmed Presbyterian, but that was the last time I actually went to church. The worst thing I can think of is making up your mind about religion without ever going to church. It’s like trying to take the MCAT without ever having cracked Gray’s Anatomy.

I prefer Thomas Paine’s view of “My mind is my own church.” I’m a walking contradiction. A natural born skeptic on one hand, but I do believe nothing is impossible. I guess that romantic part of me is what leaves me open to anything. To the possibility that we can create our own religion and be just as fulfilled as those who choose to belong to someone else's.

Not believing in anything at all would make me sad. I believe in goodwill and conviction and myself. I believe in human compassion. Democracy. Science. Hope. You don’t have to be religious to have faith. For a while there I didn’t know where I fit, I was somewhere between agnostic and atheist, though I really don’t have any clear cut desire to be any one thing.

I think one of my biggest problems with religion is that I don’t like people telling me what to believe. Part of me also feels like people use god or religion as their excuse. My friend died in a car accident because it was part of god’s plan. I am homeless because this is what god wants for me. I murdered him because my religion called for it. That’s just bullshit. Your friend died because someone else was drunk and driving. You're homeless because you can't get a job because your parents didn't make you go to school. You killed him because your DSM-IV test indicates that you're legally insane. It's all about free will. I can't stand when people don't man up to the consequences of their actions and it happens more frequently every day. There is no integrity in placing blame and for me, that's no way to live.

Though the saying “religion is the opiate of the masses” rings particularly true with me, I can see the good in it. When people can’t explain why bad things happen in the world, religion is a good place to turn to. Religion means all is not lost. Religion is hope. I see the worth in it, but it’s just not for me. I see too much potential in the human race and sooner or later, we’ll get it right. To me, that’s much more powerful than any religion.

Doesn't share well with others.

In an age where the "share everything" mentality has become the mantra of all twenty-somethings, I have to think, why?

Why do I feel compelled to churn away at my keyboard, advancing screen after screen of thought after thought. Why do I not feel some sort of satisfaction from censoring the good parts and keeping them for myself?

There was a time when writing was a very private thing for me. When I could sit down, get black on white and come full circle within myself. Some people figure things out with equations or by talking it out with a therapist until it makes sense. I figure things out on paper. With words. With the way they sound. How each one connects to each other. And after I place that last period, my thoughts somehow end up making sense.

That hasn't come as easily to me lately and I can't help but feel that in gaining an audience, I've also lost something.

I think there's something to being transparent. To disclose without fear or favor. But lately, all of this capricious divulging seems purposeless and unoriginal. It seems driven by a motivation that's foreign to me. And I don't feel as close to my thoughts as I usually do.

Maybe it's because instead of coming full circle on paper, I've finally done it out there. In real life.

And now. There's just less to figure out.