12:37 p.m. - 2008-07-28
It's been one week left on the countdown for a year now.
I find myself stuck in my head a lot lately and it's a nice kind of feeling. It is similar to sitting on the gliding chair on the deck a few summers back, sun on my face causing my eyes to close and just feeling the breeze. Today's weather is reminiscent of that, but the gliding chair has not been on the deck in years now. Still, somehow the past feels very much present today.
Dad is out of work again and trying to be a part of my life, engaging in conversation that he knows will send me into a passionate rant. I hate when people cheat others and simply try to pacify them.
My first memory ever is pleasant and stars my dad, which is strange to me because I used to be terrified of him. I remember Don Maclean singing American Pie on the radio placed in front of the garage and everything smelled like cut grass and motor oil. My dad's old rusty blue ford was in the driveway and he was washing it, buckets of soapy water all around as he sang along with the radio. Inside mom doing the dishes and singing along as well to the radio on in the living room on the same station, and all the windows open in the house. I was hanging over the railing where the roses climb now and watching until my dad saw me and asked if I wanted to help. I ran down the steps and into the driveway and dug deep in the soapy bucket until there was soap all up my arm and I had finally found a sponge covered in suds. he told me to wash the tires and I'm sure I had more water on me than the truck by the end.
Back to the present, I tend to encounter people who want me to be younger, who tend to think I am and I accept the role happily. I am content to be everyone's little sister, aside from my own sisters and then I respectfully take the oldest role. It doesn't make sense because I can take care of myself, but so many people just want someone to take care of and even if it doesn't mean actually doing anything, just letting them feel like your protector is a nice role.
My phone vibrates incessantly today with people I have hardly seen this summer wanting to go on adventures. There is an echo in the back of my head saying less than three weeks and I agree without hard feelings, knowing that as the years continue, this is going to become more usual.
I wish this sun would shine on me forever and that the air would always smell this sweet, but even when I find myself amongst the heavy air of the burgh, I know to count my blessings.
I have found today that every ordinary act should be a reason to be proud. Ability to perform the most ordinary of chores is still a reason to be content in knowing that you don't have to count on anyone else. Still, suffocation is standard in this country.
The news gets me every time. I like to be informed, but so many of the stories sneak between my ribs and get to my heart. I get too attached. The Orangutans break my heart and almost immediately I decide my life goal is to save them, along with the children of the world and at the same time I want to stop the world and cure aids and find a way to prevent cancer. Almost immediately, I want to put all of this on myself. Would I put all of the world's suffering on myself for the sake of a guaranteed happiness for the world? Yes. Without a second thought, but that was not the question Dostoevsky asked. He asked if you could guarantee the happiness of the world in exchange for one small, innocent child taking on all the suffering in the world, would you? And you see, the changes everything. It is easy to assign a life of torment to yourself. Being the martyr is easy. Perhaps the easiest thing there is. But to be the one who assigns that same life to another is to have a life of guilt and it's too hard to make that decision. Dostoevsky says this is the issue that presented itself with Jesus. I want to know how so many people let Him answer take on the world's suffering. Philosophy cannot answer all of my questions. I wish it could.
My uncle thinks he can answer all of my questions, but he can't either.
I'm quiet today as I listen to my parents and uncle talk. They're so serious. There's always the occasional dumb joke but in general, they take themselves so seriously. That simply makes reason number 99 that I do not want to grow up.
Can you hear what I'm saying with my eyes and sad smile? Mellow music has me today, yet somehow Tegan and Sara seem to understand also.
Why did we stop dancing?
