It's taken me a while, but I've reached some conclusions.

It's a natural part of life really, for any human that is. People slowly drift apart. In my case, and maybe some others, it can also happen quite abruptly. The bottom line though is that people drift apart. It's just what happens. Time passes slowly, we live quite a long time and the fact of the matter is we can't always be with the people we want to be. It happens for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it happens for no reason. Life keeps creeping along though, myself floating away in one direction and you in another. We all have our paths, some straight and narrow, some erratic and jittery, some hesitant; there are as many paths as there are ways someone can live their life. It's because of that path that we can both run into each other and run away from each other. The only constant is that life continues.

Life continues and sometimes you don't have any say in your direction, you can't stop yourself from drifting away from those you want to be with. That's half the problem. The other half is that you lack control over the lives of others, you can't catch them and make them stay. Sure you can reach out and try to grab a hold of them, but it doesn't always work.

There are a few forms of distance we experience on an everyday basis:

Physical distance. You have to move, other people have to move. Jobs, schooling, family, there are many reasons.

Emotional distance. We can be physically close yet remain distant from each other. Arguments, lack of communication, there are many reasons.

Temporal distance. This is the oddest type of distance. Sometimes we just don't live in the same time as each other. Some people have to work for a living, some people are still in school, some people have started families, some people have become very mature. People will always have different life experiences and sometimes it separates them from you. It's not that you're far away, or that you don't feel the same way you used to about someone, it's just that you can't understand them. They're at a different point in their life than you are. They understand and look at the world differently than you. This is perhaps the one type of distance we have the least amount of control over and it's possibly the greatest distance you can experience from someone.

We experience some sort of distance from every single person we've met in our lives in one form or another, even if it's only temporary. Yet again, life still continues as these distances grow.

And you know what? Maybe that's the problem.

You can never go back, you can never say the things you meant to say, you can never do the things you meant to do. Instead, you can keep living your life wondering what would or could have happened. You can keep looking for those people from your past and you may indeed find them again (in one way or another), yet you can never find the person you lost. The simple fact is, they're another person now. They've changed, you've changed, it's not the same. Those things you wanted to say? The things you wanted to do? They won't have the same impact. Time degrades the meaning of things.

So instead you keep living, looking for that person from your past, hoping to find them. Not the physical person, but the person they were. The problem is you're never going to find them. Never.


My point is: there are so many things I wish I had done for the people in my life, so many things I wish I said to the people in my life. I still know some of these people and I've considered going back to them and doing or saying these things, but it's pointless. It won't be the same. I'm going to keep making these mistakes and keep looking for people I'm sure to lose in the future... but at least I understand what's happening and why it's happening.

Maybe one day I'll learn to do and say the things I want to in the present when I want to do them, when I want to say them... when they'll mean exactly what they're supposed to mean.

Hm.

For 20 years now I've always felt like I've wanted to somehow do something bigger than myself, become someone bigger than myself. It's only now that I realize I just want to do something that is myself and be someone that's just myself.

So much for doing anything

I'm bad at it all. I feel like I've regressed in many aspects of my life.

I can't sleep.

More realizations.

Apparently I can write down and say that I'll do things, but that doesn't mean I'll actually do them. So far I'm not really making any progress with any of my goals and have mostly been holed up in my house like a hermit this summer.

I'm getting that ever so familiar feeling of restlessness that I don't feel like doing anything about. Despite being so familiar it's quite hard to explain.

Dammit.

The Great Gatsby

I finally read it. Not quite sure what to make of it. I know it's supposed to be about the downfall of the American dream in the 20's, but I feel it could be summed up better as 'rich people have affairs and get into trouble while a upper-middle class man narrates and gets caught up in their problems'.

Maybe I'm biased. I suppose it does get across the feelings of being rich in the 1920's. As for the American dream, I don't think anyone can even define what the American dream is, so how could you comment on what this book says about it? Obviously Fitzgerald probably has a different opinion as to what it is than I do. I guess I believe it's equality for everyone, and Fitzgerald seems to think it's something else, maybe being poor and having the chance to become rich.

But then again, that's all it is, luck, chance. You could work hard every day and not get rich. You could work harder than the rich and those who become rich and still suffer and starve.

So I think the American dream never really existed, that sounds right to me. It's impossible. It was never shattered, there was never a green light on the other side of the bay. There's simply people on one side of the bay and people on the other side of the bay. People on one side of the bay stare all day at the other side and hope to get there, while the people on the other side never look back and only care about what's happening on their side. Some people set out on boats to get to the other side but the wind is almost always too strong for them to cross, once and a while the wind happens to favor one boat, suddenly they've made it to the other side and they never look back and claim they made it there on their own power.

If I had to say the American dream is anything, it's that: Hoping the wind is generous to you, then when it finally is claiming that there is no such thing as wind.

Obviously I'm making generalizations here, but I believe this to be true for the most part.

The Bystander Effect or: Diffusion of Responsibility or: Somebody Else's Problem or: The Exact Opposite of How I'll Live My Life

Pardon my use of Wikipedia to define these terms.

The bystander effect is a social psychological phenomenon in which individuals are less likely to offer help in an emergency situation when other people are present. The probability of help is inversely proportional to the number of bystanders. In other words, the greater the number of bystanders, the less likely it is that any one of them will help.

Diffusion of responsibility is a social phenomenon which tends to occur in groups of people above a certain critical size when responsibility is not explicitly assigned. This mindset can be seen in the phrase "No one raindrop thinks it caused the flood".

Somebody Else's Problem (also known as Someone else's problem or SEP) is an effect that causes people to ignore matters which are generally important to a group but may not seem specifically important to the individual.

In a sentence these all essentially equate to one thing: Doing nothing to stop something that is happening right in front of you just because there are other people around (who also happen to be doing nothing).

I refuse to let this happen to me. I know it's against my very nature as a person, I'm usually quiet, I don't like to draw attention to myself, I don't like to interfere in random people's business, I don't like to speak up in a crowd. At the very same time however, I would hate myself if I ever stood by while something horrible happened to someone else. I'm honestly not sure what I would do myself if this happened to me, I'm pretty sure I would completely despise myself as a person.

What does this all mean? If I ever see someone in trouble, in need of help, in dire consequences, in any sort of situation where I can personally do something, I'm going to do something. I'm going to speak up, I'm going to get involved, I'm going to take action. I don't care if it's someone simply tripping and dropping their papers everywhere or if it's something much more serious. I don't want to be that guy who stands by and does nothing. So many people do nothing. I want to do something.

I just want to help.

I'm going to help from now on.

60 miles away

Some 60 miles away about 300 kids are probably having one of the best nights of their summer.
Some 60 miles away from them I'm sitting at home doing nothing.
Some 60 miles away in another direction resides the biggest and liveliest city in the country.

I think this sums up my current state of life.

P.S. Is it possible to enjoy life without money?