Airport of Thames Do you ever sit still because you can't go back and can't go forward? Like there is a pool with no bottom to it in front of you and a fire of dull warmth that will burn you over time behind you? That's right where it wants you. It wants you to be stiffled and tricked and paranoid and frozen in time so that when the time comes, you are powerless. When that moment comes to act you are scared shitless and decide it's better never to move than to move wrong. Thats when it's got you. When you're convinced that from here on out, it's this one decision that shapes the rest and everyone is watching. The past is then just something that led up to this and has it's value all determined here. The present is just leading up to that moment. That moment directs the entire lump sum of your destiny and the future? Well it all depends how good your choice is. What will you do? How will that use everything you've learned? Who will employ you? Is that what you want out of life? Where do you want to live after this, and forever on? Where will you live, eat, shit, work, and die until your dying ends? You don't know? You should.....

This is the great lie of college graduation.

At times I've spinned so deep in this pool that I'd rather drop out two months before I finish than actually recieve that degree. And I don't believe it is all self manifested. From the moment I mention May, each person asks nearly identical questions, regardless of their age, sex, race, political standing.....like the world has gathered my whole life into little sections labled "childhood" "high school/adolescence" "college" "the rest of your life". The blank stare, broad and hollow smile that greats them along with the gentle raise of shoulders makes my fingers go numb as the questioner looks at me with worry. You don't know? they reply, as if I have just denounced all of mankind and the sum of my worth in that one little moment.

No, I don't.

And here is where I find my strength.
I woke up today, Sunday the 3rd of Febuary, and decided nothing. I wondered downstairs, looked at the cereal, then the oatmeal, the flaxmeal, and the my mushy banana. In minutes my stomach was full and I was on my way to the market for fresh produce. Next I was enjoying some tea, thinking about plastic cups, and then calling my mom. Landing in a friend of a friends apartment, we talked about nothing but everything and i enjoyed the sunshine. Back home, I slept, wrote, read, and went to work.
NONE of that was planned. All of it happened, and tomorrow something else will happen without being planned. Every day, every month, every year for the rest of my life will follow. One decision that I make might last longer or shorter than the one before, effect one part or many of my life, but it is only in duration that they shall have significance. If tomorrow I decide to move to Africa and then on Tuesday I decide I hate it, I don't have to stay there. I am a free agent and every second of the rest of my life is just as free.
So why, out of all the seconds in my life, is that one second after graduation the one that controls the rest of my life? Why, is it that one week after I am no longer a student, the week where I must decide where everything else in life will happen and when?

That is the great lie of college graduation.

it doesn't. i dont. And I don't ever need to know......  ¶ 5:28 PM 4 Comments