There, but for the Grace of God
So, I’d like to take this opportunity out to thank the two kinds of people on this earth that were it up to me, we’d all be ignorant, uneducated, slaves to some totalitarian regime. Soldiers and Teachers. I’m much too much of a fraidy cat to go into a foriegn land with gat in hand and pop some folks who probably have nothing to do with the real problem (leaders being assholes) in the name of freedom. And then, live there for years on end away from my family in order to keep the peace. God Bless those men and women. And Teachers. I fear for our future when I hear the stories that my peers and associates who are teachers come back and tell. 7th graders feeling each other up on the back of school buses. 5th graders who wear see through shirts and Victoria’s Secret lacy bras underneath. 2nd graders who tell stories of performing fellatio on their stepdads with the ease of recounting the last episode of Spongebob Squarepants they watched. Kindergarteners who wear 2 inch heeled leather boots to school. And completeley unaffected parents (therein lies the rub). And Teachers… let me qualify: THE REAL TEACHERS WHO CARE AND WANT TO SEE A BETTER TOMORROW… must sift through the crap that these parents have made of their lives and liberally sprinkled it all over their kids… to find a MIND. Fully functional, eager, full of potential brain. And then cultivate it. Despite the crap that it had to come through. Tonight, I am most thankful that they exist. I hope there are kids that get to have those heros in their lives.
I had dinner with my ADP last night. And we were talking about the restaurant we were at. And I told her I considered having my birthday party this year there. And she said… “That’s right…. you turn 30 this year.” And I said, “Yes I do.” and this surge of tears welled up in my eyes… and a lump in my throat. All of the sudden. And it wasn’t a happy to have been living this long welling. It was a sad painful…OH MY GOD ARE YOU SERIOUS? I didn’t get ANYTHING done kind of welling. I’m looking left and right and losing my friends to adulthood. As I meander in the world of youth. My peers are getting married, having kids, moving away, getting promotions to HUGE positions… and here I am. Alone. I don’t fit in their lives when these changes occur. I watch from afar and admire their beautiful, well planned, well thought out lives. Wondering where I went wrong. It’s like I have a blockage of energy. One thing that I don’t understand that if I did… I could excel to where everyone else is. Something fundamental is missing and it’s what I need to grow up. But… I don’t know what it is.
What you know you can’t explain, but you feel it. You’ve felt it your entire life, that there’s something wrong with the world. You don’t know what it is, but it’s there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. -Morpheus in The Matrix
Never in life have I agreed more with a comment… but finding someone to verbalize it didn’t make it easier to deal with. I’m still going mad.
*
Leave a Reply