A long while ago I wrote my very first scrap post. It was all about my feelings on the fires going on in Colorado Springs. I didn't expect the responses I got, in fact I honestly didn't expect any responses at all. I simply wanted to get my feelings and thoughts out there. Sure I could have kept them inside and went about other Miz-related business, but I didn't. It's an interesting thing we humans do. We share our opinions, our thoughts, our feelings, things that matter to us with the world, whether through a journal, a blog, or even a scrapbook on a forum site full of total strangers.
Sometimes its kind of scarey. The last verse to one of my favorite songs, Breathe by Anna Nalick, goes
"2 am and I'm still awake writing a song,
if I get it all down on paper it's no longer inside of me,
threatening the life it belongs to.
And I feel like I'm naked in front of the crowd
'cause these words are my diary screamin' out loud,
and I know that you'll use them, however you want to."
That's the thing about writing things out physically or digitally. Once they're out there, they're out there. You can delete it or rip it out and throw it away, but once it's been seen by someone else... There's no taking it back. You've taken a piece of yourself and you've put it out there for others to see.
And really they can do whatever they like to it. Hack away at it with knives and cleavers. Poke at it curiously. Or perhaps add a bit of themselves to it as well.
Because really we're all of us very different. We come from different places, different backgrounds, with different upbringings and different opinions and beliefs formed by different events or circumstances.
So sometimes, we write about something random, perhaps mundane. I've seen a comic based blog that was simply about some guy's day to day life. He wasn't anything special, he wasn't a spy or a hero or a politician. He wasn't documenting his struggle with some illness or huge problem. He was just some nerdy college kid, going through plain boring life. Even though it seemed kind of boring, it was interesting. He was good at drawing and he had a pretty cool sense of humor. I went through a few of his pages, and when I got bored I simply went onto something else.
One time I ran into this random woman's blog. I vaguely knew her from church but we weren't close in any way. The whole thing was about her family. Pictures and stories, long bragging posts about their accomplishments and her own, and long rants about issues she was dealing with. Frankly it was kind of annoying. I didn't care about her or her family or what they ate for dinner two weeks ago. I didn't care or relate to what I saw as major "first world problems" that she blew up to sound like world-ending deals. I saw comments and contributions from friends of hers or other family members who sympathized with what she talked about and supported and congratulated the things she wrote. I thought "Man, this is stupid. These people have no idea what real problems are, why can't they talk about something interesting, intellectual for goodness sakes. Yeah you have a family big woop thousands of other people have families that
wish they could spend time blogging about the things you do."
But then it hit me.
This was
her blog. These were things that mattered and interested
her. It didn't matter what I thought or what I cared about. This wasn't
my blog. What she was talking about didn't encroach on
my life. It might have been different if she were pushing the whole thing on me or forcing me to read it all. But she wasn't. It was my choice to even look at it. So I did something so much simpler than going off on my own little tantrum about how I apposed the subjects she wrote about.
I closed the window.
Opened a new one.
And went on with my life.
We're all dealing with our own stuff. People talk about personal opinions and experiences, but those things don't solely define them or their lives. Someone could be talking about something like a shirt they bought that they really
really liked. And someone else may see that and think "Wow. You have nothing better to talk about than
shirts?!?! You ignorant lucky little brat. I have so many problems you couldn't even
begin to imagine, the world has so many problems you obviously don't even
realize."
You know. This girl who went to my high school committed suicide a couple weeks ago. The last thing she talked about on her Facebook was a shirt she got at Wal Mart.
Unless you knew her really well personally you'd have no idea the magnitude of the things she was going through at home.
It is impossible to know everything that someone is or isn't going through simply because of something they wrote. I hate the phrase "The grass is greener on the other side." But seriously that's a natural, default mentality human beings seem to have. Unless someone blatantly states some horrific thing going on with them, then they automatically must have it better. Then they automatically must not care about anything else in the world or have any sort of concern with the huge problems that are plaguing it.
My history teacher my senior year taught us something I'll never forget. And that was to be an Open Minded Seeker of Truth. The first step to that was empathy. Try to understand what others are feeling and what they're going through. He showed us video after video about people who had been raped, beaten, killed, driven to suicide, tied to trucks dragged until decapitated. All because of things like sexual orientation. Race. Beliefs. Appearance.
Everyone is suffering. Everyone has something to say. Whether its about shirts, dinner recipes, or a comic depicting a day of missing the bus. Thing is no one told you to listen. If you can't have an open mind and contribute, if you simply don't care, then fine. Don't care. Maybe you think people are whining trying to get attention with problems that don't concern you or the rest of the world. Maybe you have apposing opinions and disagree. Okay great! Share your thoughts! I love having intellectual discussions where differing opinions can be shared maturely. But simply calling out what someone else speaks about, in their own space, on their own time, is nonsense. I said it before in a past post. Its the internet. No one said you had to be here. No one said you had to be on that page. There's a beautiful red x up there in the corner that some designer/coder specifically made, just for you.
Edit: Speaking of recipes,
this is my favorite. I'm not a huge fan of almonds, but I made these once for a birthday party and everyone, even the little kids, ate it instead of the cake.
)
by Minerva Agatha Zipporah on September 9th, 2012, 2:48 am 
