We Are All Passengers
There are some things in this life that you can't explain, and the more you try to justify your words and actions, the less meaning they have.
I grew up in a family that promoted a belief in God - and to this day, it's difficult for me to write the word 'God' without a capital G.
As much as I despise the church and a lot of the sanctions and religiosity that come from that sector, I do understand the healthiness in thinking outside of oneself. I think that we are at a cultural crossroads - where people are far too self involved and don't take enough time to think outside of their own spheres.
Even the most unreligious writers of all time like Kerouac, Hemingway, Bukowski and Thompson took the time to think outside of their own skulls - they looked to the possibility of a great beyond.
I had the chance to meet for coffee with my sister Laura today. Laura is someone who lives a pretty quiet, non-public existence, but who understands and listens with an unjudgmental eye to every word that is uttered to her. She once ran a B&B on a fucking ISLAND in Nicaragua (oh - and that same island has two volcanoes on it and is surrounded by a fresh water lake). I've known her for a long time (over 20 years), and even though she is someone I don't see often, when I do, we get down to business. We talk about the heart. We talk about longing and loss and what the future just might hold.
We had the chance to talk about friends today - and how sometimes, friends start relationships with people that you don't want in your life - but how, in the end, you get past your own bullshit hangups and learn to accept people for who they are and how, if someone truly is your friend, you accept their decisions and back them up. We sat at a Starbucks, stared out of a Merivale Road window, and let this truth sink in.
If there is a 'God', I'd like to think that He or She would hug any boyfriend or girlfriend of a friend with open arms and pure childish enjoyment.
It was a good moment. And we were both passengers on a ship of something beyond ourselves.
