I didn’t really know what to do with this goal before. But I think I realise now. Man, I am so, so sick of people putting others down. Bitching about them. Everyone is so friggin two-faced, and it makes me sick. Cus I know that I’m the same. But I don’t want to be. I don’t care if other people want to make themselves feel better by gossiping about others, I’m having none of it. People are people, we’re ALL worthy of love and attention, no matter how different or annoying we are. Fuck you all for being such hypocritical bitches. People deserve more than that. If you want to have friends, be a friend to other people. Jesus died for the world while we were still his enemies, so surely we’re capable of loving our enemies too? I dunno, but I want to try.
People doing this are also doing these things:
Entries
How cool is that! I invented a goal other people want to do. That’s awesome. I’m not really done with this goal. I need to do a lot more work on it and may add entries periodically, but I have begun seeing people in clouds – well, only one person, really – so I’m good for now.
I may not always say the perfect thing or come across all warm and fuzzy, but I can be a great listener when I turn off the noise in my head and tune in to people. It doesn’t always happen, but when it does, people will tell me the most painful things about their lives. It’s amazing, really. I need to start turning off the noise more often, because when someone makes themselves vulnerable by sharing something so personal with me, it’s like a gift of trust and intimacy.
I just met this man recently, a friend of my mother’s, and the first time we were alone in the room together he began telling me about when he was a boy. I don’t feel like getting into the details; they were sad, and the story began with him and his siblings abandoned in a hotel room. He’s in his fifties now, but I looked into his eyes – blue, they were – and I could tell he could’ve cried. And then people flooded back into the room, and the moment was over, but I was grateful to have connected with someone, to have talked about something that mattered, and to have been given this gift from this man, who reminded me that I am not just this moody, aloof, judgmental person I can sometimes be, but that when I let my guard down and make the effort to engage, there are people who can draw out my compassion and feel safe with me.
Hmmm, this goal seems to be as much about self-discovery as it is about discovering others.
Or you could say my daughter was. I asked them if I could leave her at school for the extended day because of the funeral and they were very accommodating. (I did let her say goodbye at the viewing but I was reluctant to bring her to the funeral itself.) Anyway, there is a new teacher there who is still in college but is helping out during the summer. She seems very sweet and shy, and when we picked our daughter up, she gave me this sketch she had done of her during nap time. I was so touched.
This brown girl in this white family, with a new stepfather and a new little brother who looks so different from her. I wonder how many times people have asked if she’s adopted. But she’s making her way just fine, I think.
“Jasmine like the princess?” someone asks.
“I don’t have time to be a princess. I’m too busy being a ninja!”
Later she plays her flute for me but tells me she really wants to play the sax. She shows me her sketches and tells me she likes drawing in black and white, that getting colors right is too hard. But when she gives me a picture she’s drawn for me, the colors are bursting off the page.
Before she leaves she teaches me how to play a video game. What a cool girl. I wish I got to see her more often.
My teacher made us go people watching once. It is a really great experience and it opens your eyes to other people. I wrote a poem about it:
She rushes from place to place,
but has nowhere to go.
He seems happy with her.
She doesn’t.
He is the proof that the judged
are the least judgmental
She is lost,
but no one notices her obvious pain.
They have had and held,
in poverty and wealth,
good and bad,
illness and health,
loved and cherished.
They’re just waiting for the death part.
You’d think that the bell brings out the good in people,
but as they pass him by,
the bell rings louder.
Looking forlorn on the side of the road. Her parents in the intersection, one of them squawking on a cell phone and the other examining their busted up car. Another car is cross-ways in the road, broken pieces of headlight scattered around. The little girl sits in the grass in her birthday crown and a pink party dress. How happy and excited she must have been a few moments ago.
