Zip it

Sometimes my mind drifts to a place where I wonder what is there left to live for? I know the answer to that question: I have a loving family, I've had an overall good life, I've had a good education and maybe I have potential to do something good some day. I live for the people I love and who love me, and I live for the hope that I could someday take part in making the world just a little more livable and tolerable for some people.

But sometimes it's that latter hook that gets loose in my mind. Sometimes I remind myself of one of those hopeless people suffering neurasthenia, trying to find something fulfilling in a dizzying anomic world.

These days I just can't sleep well anymore. I stay up until 3 or 4 a.m., reading or tossing and turning in bed, only to have to wake up at 10 a.m. feeling exhausted. I drag myself through days where I can hardly keep my eyes open or think a positive thought; my mind fixated on the warm, rejuvenating comfort of bed. Sometimes I crash in a mid-day nap only to have to wake up to do homework and try to maintain a semblance of a "normal" schedule.

My taste gravitates to sad or weird songs. If I'm not mourning or drowning in my imaginary misery, I'm contemplating some oddity or weirdness. I'm surrounded by beautiful people on campus every day. We touch, brushing shoulders constantly, but the physical proximity betrays light-years of isolation that separate us beyond contact. It's lifeless. Their eyes are glazed and see right through me like a ghost. My shoulder flings backward upon impact, but they walk right on by.

I think about the fumingly infuriated boy who hurled a banana at me and my friend today with such force that it exploded as it bombarded the elevator wall. I reminds me that I'm drowning in a sea of hatred and intolerance, and I can't escape. Misunderstandings and miscommunication are mistaken and these misinterpretations fuel fiery impulsive anger that explodes at any point of friction.

From the dorm, to the classroom, to the city, to the state, to the country, to the global village we live in.

Social justice! Social justice! Activism! Get involved! We can make a difference! But these chants of hope have been used so much that their content is now empty. Making a difference means going to conference, means spending money, means sitting on a boring conference call for 3 hours, means signing on the dotted line and hoping that the fine print ain't too damning, means, means, means... I get short of breath at the thought.

Must I defer my potential to bring tolerance and equality to this world to UN ambassador-celebrities like Nicole Kidman and Angelina Jolie? I envy them, knowing I will never be them, knowing I could work just as hard and never get the power to do what they do. Do I need to have been married Tom Cruise for a few years or do I need to be having Brad Pitt's baby in order to promote women's rights and stop child trafficking? And tell me why these noble causes need to be juggled with, sometimes taking a backseat to, stints at movie-making?

Freedom of speech; but I can hardly mouth a word I believe in. Who's going to pull up dirt on me 30 years from now if I run for office? Who's going to take what I wrote out of context? Who's going to accuse me of saying something I may have written in an e-mail to a close friend that was never meant to be shared with the whole world? Who's going to get hold of every little digitized detail of my past and waive it in my face one day, blackmailing me with the potential to ruin my life?

Who's going to read these words in such a busy world? Who's going to promise not to write and publish junk just to make a buck? We're drowning in information, who's to know what's worth paying attention to anymore? Attempt to be that educated, informed person for one day and you'll feel like you've been dropped into the middle of a 75mph superhighway. They're honking at you and screaming at you and flicking you off. Go this way, go that way! They're cursing you. Next thing you know you've been run over or the cops arrest you for disturbing the traffic flow.

These days good intentions and good deeds won't get you very far at all. Walk a foot and you're bound to crash into someone who thinks you're just plain evil (unless of course you freak out, appease, and decide to agree with their fast-to-judge, quick-to-speak banter).

I listen and read at least ten times more than I talk and write. Why? But really, why do I even bother to talk and write at all?... when I know that if I dare, someone's waiting around the corner to shoot me down, bomb me, drop missiles, slap me, scream, crush, act personally offended, rudely disagree, or hurl 100-mph flying bananas my way?