A far better thing that I do...

So, I'm going to go more sappy here and less cynical for a moment.  This post will also not be about politics or clothing or anything like that.  Rather, I'm going to wax poetic for a bit.


So, the other day I was having a good conversation with my good friend Jesse Luciani (Great guy, ladies.  Careful, though, he's taken.) about what it truly means to love.  Now, I've been a perpetrator of the sappy, idealistic, puppy love rampant in teenagers and only slightly less common in adults.  I've gone on and on about love and how "painful and haunting" it can be.  Yeah, I've been that guy.  But here we were talking about real love for someone.  The kind of love that would cause you to forfeit your happiness, or your life, for the happiness of another.  In our selfish world, this idea seems so foreign that it doesn't bare thought at all.  Now, I do not pretend to be a scholar or an expert on movements of the heart, but I do know a few things about what love is not.  Love is not obsession or ownership.  Many seem to think that love is a claim you have on a person, that you own them and they owe something to you.  Such is not the case.  Love is given fully and without compensation.  When you give a person your love, they owe you nothing.  No, not even their love in return.  They may give it, but don't be under the illusion that because you love someone, they MUST love you back.  No, they don't.  Love is the unconditional caring for another person above and beyond yourself, not the possession of that person.  So, Jesse and I were talking about this philosophy, and we came to two of our favorite stories on the subject.  Or, rather, two embodiments of this idea: Sydney Carton and Rick Blaine.  In Casablanca, Rick Blaine is suddenly and unsuspectingly reunited with the woman he considers the love of his life, only to find she is married.  Of course, a love triangle ensues as Ilsa is still torn between Rick and her husband, Victor, a resistance leader and fugitive from the Nazis.  But Rick, despite his love, not only lets Ilsa go, but MAKES her go with her husband, knowing that he can never be happy with her and that Victor needs her to keep up his fight.  He gives her up for her own happiness and for the greater good of humanity.  In A Tale of Two Cities, Sydney Carton goes even further.  He loves a married woman, one who does not love him back or even know of his love.  So, when her husband is about to be killed, what does he do?  Carton replaces him in prison, giving his life for the husband of his love.  He gives his life, gladly, for the happiness of the woman he loves, even if that happiness is without him.  


Now, I'm not entirely sure what I'm trying to say here, and I'm certainly not advocating giving your life for just anyone because you think you may love them.  That's not at all what I'm saying, but maybe this will give some perspective to someone out there, and maybe give some food for thought.

For spacious skies

In the past several years, I have had to come to grips with the fact that the country I live in is no longer the greatest country to have ever been.  I can only really say that we are the greatest country in the world for lack of competition, but the America that exists today is not one I can be proud of.  We started as the greatest underdog story.  Our founders rose up against injustice to form a new country absent of the tyranny prevalent in the rest of the world.  Against all odds, they fought against the strongest military power of their day and won.  In this country, we built industry, innovated and invented, we took to the roads and to the skies, we built higher and stronger than anyone else, we brought light into the dark and connected everyone with the telephone.  We survived a civil war which, through dividing us, made us stronger.  We went on to win two world wars and fight against tyranny again, bringing freedom to the world.  Yes, our country's history is far from perfect.  A country of people can not be exempt from their follies.  But despite the many blemishes and imperfections, we have a whole lot to be proud of.  We achieved more in less than 250 years than can be adequately accounted for in any one place.  So what happened?  This was a country where prosperity and success were rewarded, where shooting for the stars was only the beginning and the possibilities were endless.  We built things to last and, if unsatisfied, we made better.  Now where are we?  Now, we are a country of stagnation, where mediocrity is the norm.  We buy products to be replaced after a year.  We produce nearly nothing and export even less.  Our innovations are almost all consumer based and are obsolete within months.  We eat carbon-copy food full of additives and chemicals barely deemed edible and do nothing about it.  We sue to avoid responsibility for our own actions.  We take pills and get surgery instead of exercising or eating right.  We call customer service with the expectation that we will be treated poorly.  We do all this and we sit in our living rooms and bitch endlessly while doing nothing about it.  We are told that we have two candidates to choose from, two candidates whom the majority can not, in good conscious, choose.  But, we are told that choosing any other is a "waste of your vote."  Our founders gave us a choice.  Our founders put the power in the hands of the people, but we have given that power away; to the government and the media.  We are uninformed and indifferent, under the false notion that ignorance is bliss. Our education system is failing, but we penalize instead of nurture it.  Our healthcare system is flawed, but we are trying to replace it with something that is already failing abroad.  Prosperity is now a dirty word and success is a sin.  We punish the rich for being rich, regardless of how they got there, and we reward those who give up on employment and use our safety nets as a hammock.  This was the greatest country to have ever existed, and we still have the potential to be.  Americans, stand up and demand what you deserve.  Demand an end to standardized mediocrity and demand better.  Make better, do better, be better.  We are an exceptional people, now lets act it.  Let us be known not for what was, but for what is and what will be.