New Tracks

                It feels like my old friends that I see all the time, change all the time. The old friends I have and hardly ever see haven’t changed at all. I just have a feeling that everyone is on a completely different track than what they set out on. I may have a little bit more cargo than before, but I’m still that same 6:03am AMTRAK destined to arrive in Chicago at 9:30. Everyone around is on different paths now and I feel left behind.

                I guess resistance to change is what makes bigots, it’s what makes the ignorance that we scoff at in our history books. So am I any better for choosing to stay true to the person I decided to be when I was teenager? No. I think my morals are little stronger now, and that’s why I feel like I’m better. Maybe it’s just pretentiousness that makes me feel like I need to be the voice of reason with friends that have been acting different.

                In my eyes all I could see is old friends slowly ticking time off their life. Yet they only ever thought of it as an escape in troubling times. And I pressured them to shape up. Times were tough, and I made it harder. As I sit here staring into a framed picture with my best friend and the word “Family” written on the frame, I feel like that I’ve been anything but a brother.

                My point is, how far is too far in intervention? Am I over stepping my bounds and stopping my ever changing best friend from being who she wants to be? Everyone is inconsistent; it’s a  universal laws of personality and communication. I’m no better by pointing out inconsistency. I can’t stop people changing, but I can’t just change with them, how do I prioritize my identity with the people I love? Luckily, this time I wasn't really left behind, but that doesn’t mean I’m safe. Maybe it’s inevitable that old high school friends part ways, but I’ll never give up until the very last railroad tie.

Reasons to be afraid

                I’ve always been told that my writing was great, that I always had a way with the words I chose. Not once in my life has someone read something I put my heart into and told me “This is bad. I don’t like your ideas or writing style.” And that scares me.

                I know what a huge problem to have, no one has ever disliked my writing. Yet the more I think about it the more it eats away at me. Good writers get the readers to think. Great writers get readers to act. Lately I’ve been reading Hemingway, and all I could think about was how good it was, how involved in the story I got. I stumbled across a few negative reviews and spent the time to read them. The first thought of course was how ignorant and aggressive people like that are, but it can also be something so different. Even for the people spewing hate, Hemingway made them act. His words were so powerful to extend  past the pages and into life. I know I remember the books I hate just as much as the books I love.

                Where’s my haters? I don’t have anyone yet. There’s just a small chance that everything I write is eloquent and the reader is completely swayed by me. There’s a larger chance that everyone I know is so civilized they don’t want to attack my dreams. I don’t believe in either of that. The reason that runs through my head the most is lack of presence. That everything I say is “so nice” and calm that the reader feels just a little bit stronger than indifferent. Where’s the power? I’m afraid my writing is so “cookie cutter” that I’m not saying anything truly new. It’s not like cookies taste worse with a cookie cutter, but it takes away from the power of creation. Which is a shame, because this whole blog is about me saying something new, saying something important to someone and having it stick with them for life.

                Nothing important is ever agreed upon. That’s why there are so many power struggles. People shouldn’t be reading my writing and always think “that was interesting.” I want just once for someone to honestly disagree with what I have to say, that way I know my words hold power. Maybe like many others I’m just a little tired of excelling but not changing anything.