i care…

I say,

“I care”,

but do I really mean it or have we used this filler sentence so much that it has lost its grand standing importance. Have all of us been pushed to the brink of exhaustion that we say this phrase just so the other person will reveal their story, vent, then shut up so all of us can individually move on into the void?

Do you know when someone truly means something when they say it? Can you feel it? Can you sense it? Or are all of us still numb? Numb to the fact that nobody is listening and are only waiting for their turn to speak. Numb to the fact that the world has injected us with so much novocaine that we cannot feel anything anymore. Numb to the fact that the world wants us to believe that the past is more important than our future.

I refuse to accept this.

The past is progress. The present is now. The future is where all us meet up again one day.

The future is where your dreams truly become true.

We live in a world of time flawed orders and misdirected commands and no clarity. We live in a world of selfish prioritization and desensitized concern. Unconditional love has more conditions than the side effects of a new and improved prescription. We are looking for the next big buzz or trend when we already know that it will wear off in a couple of hours and will certainly be forgotten in a week or so.

I think to myself, when was the last time I felt this tired?

The reply is simple – yesterday!

When did we quit reading between the lines? When did we lock ourselves behind doors and windows and forget about the dwindling sunrises or sunsets, a picturesque show that slowly becomes fewer with the passing of age? When did we exchange our night sky, which has been streaming a great view on a cloudless night for hundreds of thousands of years, for another, hot, straight off the market viewing platform that has to be plugged in to work?

When did we give up?

Better yet!

Why did we give up?

If I stare at a star long enough with my naked eye, I can see it twinkle. I see it flicker from a whitish silver to a deep ocean blue to a orangish flare back to its original form. There’s a couple of specific ones in the blackness that tries to catch my eye, maintain its importance, and fight for my attention.

I realize I am that star.

My cell phone will light up and try to lure me away. My first impulse is to go to it, answer it, and give it my immediate attentiveness! I realize I am a robot! I have been trained! I have been pre-programmed, subliminally. I have been conditioned, like a dog, to follow commands. I catch myself.

I stand still, in place.

Which one do I ignore?

The sky up above me or my cell phone?

Which one is truly more important at this exact point in time of introspective reflection?

All of us are trying to escape something. Where are we going? What are we going to do when we get there? Who else is going to be there with us? Who is going to be left behind? Are we the ones that are going to be in someone else’s rear view mirror before we enter the realm of our next destination.

Now, take a moment to breathe and think over your answers before continuing. Re-read the last paragraph if you need to.

…..

…

.

Did your answers hurt your feelings or did it make you feel better?

Did it make you more melancholic than you were before?

What is this unrest that currently floats around from person to person, town to town, state to state, country to country? Is it some ancient, medieval spirit trying to poke and prod us into borderline insanity, or, who needs devils and demons when Earth has pronouns like me, you, him, her, or they?

The saying goes, “a lesson learned the hard way is the best way and never soon forgotten.”

I say, “fuck that! How about no! I have enough of those shirts, but, hey, thanks for the offer. Good luck with that in the future! See you, maybe, never!”

The saying goes, “freedom is never free.”

I say, “why can’t it be? Haven’t all of us suffered enough?”

Are you truly listening to yourself and breaking down these ‘sayings’ that we continue to argue, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, decade after decade, their validity when there is none to be found? Who made everything so difficult and threw these paradoxes at us that, really, when broken down, have no relevance and make no sense at all?

My mind has a thought, when was the last time you wanted to pack your bags, gather your tribe, and head for the hills?

I reply, yesterday!

Would you rather be told, “yes”, “no”, or “wait?”

How would you feel if your ‘yes’ would have fizzled out in five years or less and left you even more hopeless than you currently may be?

How would you feel if your ‘no’ would have made you given up and you just ‘settled’ like the world is currently teaching children and adults to do all on a daily basis across the globe?

How would you feel if your ‘wait’ made you forge harder and stronger and turned you into the warrior that you currently are and in doing so all your hard work and patience and efforts and creative muster would last for generations to come or until the big asteroid finally shows up and hits reset?

Again, I ask you, “would you rather be told, ‘yes’, ‘no’, or ‘wait’?”

We confess to others that we love unconditionally, but how many stipulations are attached to our unconditional heart? Maybe that is why everyone has beef with Jesus Christ! We try to act self righteous and be exactly like Him and fail in the first minute of trying to do so. Maybe that is why everyone wants Him to be a myth because, if we cannot imitate his exact perfection and not fail in the first hour, then he is deemed not worthy to be real.

If Jesus isn’t real, maybe we’re not real either. Maybe we are a program in another failed simulation. I say this because I know a lot fake things in today’s world. I’m sure you do not, though, right? A mask for the mask so the mask can mask the mask and mask the mask that masked the mask.

… I’ll continue …

When we want to act hardcore and tough then spirituality doesn’t matter, yet when we need a miracle or life saving cure, we rub our knees and praying hands raw and want divine intervention. We want a miracle, like our lives depend on it, when we fail to realize that we already are the miracle with a message and can touch the world unlike any other.

*thumbs up, planet Earth*

If someone ‘out there’ wants to hurt themselves, whether mentally, physically, or spiritually, whether they are a friend, an enemy, or a stranger – are you going to hand them the gun, a bullet, or your open palm. Does their ‘race’ matter? Their ‘religion’? Their ‘orientation’? Their ‘mistakes’? Their ‘wallet’? Their ‘appearance’?

Are we lost in our own minds? Are we figments in other people’s? Do we help others more than we hurt them or do we choose which ones receive the two ends of the stick? How many people have we already deemed not worthy of our attention, love, and charity?

They’ll say, “well, I just do not have enough time.”

Well, join the crowd.

In today’s world, you have to create more time and insert it into places you deem worthy.

You say, “well, that’s not possible!”

I reply, “well, you are reading this article, aren’t you? How do you think I concocted this little piece for all of my lovelies out there considering my floating hell of a daily schedule?”

They’ll say, “blah, blah, blah, blah, to the blah, blah, blah, blah” because they have to have the last word.

Do you know people like that? To be sure not!

How about this!

You are only young once. You are only twenty once. You are only thirty once. You are only truly loved once, maybe twice if you are lucky, in this lifetime. You are only in high school once (well, most of us). You only get one sweet sixteen. You only get to wake up, eat cereal, and watch cartoons but for so long. You are only innocent but for so long. You only live but so long before you remember your first lie. Your first date. Your first kiss. Your first crush. Your first heartbreak.

The things that used to make our hearts flutter and get us excited soon become a monotonous dated calendar with red X’s drawn on each day that passes us by.

What happened to us?

Every red X was an opportunity to better ourselves and manifest what you, what I, was already born with. Everything you were ever meant to be is inside your heart and soul, inside mine, RIGHT NOW! No exceptions. No excuses. No victim cards.

How can you rise above with the bar set so low?

Does the noise get to you like it does me? Everywhere. At work. In the car. Out ‘there’. In my own head. My only escape is home or… my place. What happens if noise infiltrates those sacred havens? What then?

I can mute the noise at work. I do that on an every second basis while I’m there. In the car? I can roll my windows up and turn my radio down. After that, besides whatever idiot has modified their vehicle in whatever way, I’m somewhat good. In the world? All I can do is leave the cell phone and internet connection behind. In your head? Self control versus borderline paranoid schizophrenia. At home? The only good noise at home is love, laughter, and peace.

Anything else is just static.

The hum. The buzz. The hiss. Like jumping on a trampoline, making your hairs stand up on end until you touch that one piece of metal, or another person, sending a shock throughout your body while making you lightly cuss. You anticipated that shock with everything in you. You touched something really quick to rid yourself of its curse, yet it always lingered, like a never aging Voodoo woman following you around with an endless supply of tacks and pin-cushioned dolls.

That feeling still lingers.

To this day.

The pinch of a moment that you know exists in your mind and body but you have not fully come to terms with.

You’ll never rid yourself of this limbo until you are finally ready.

If you ever are. Right?

‘Acceptance’, for some,

others,

‘exceptance’.

Think about what I just typed now. Acceptance or exceptance?

Are you okay?

Does my natural and unadulterated concern for you or these issues even matter?

Even better! Does me caring ‘surprise’ you, especially in today’s world?

For some, it does. For others, it does not. As long as that hashtag hits and brings in a couple more ‘followers’ and ‘likes’? Right?

Listen to me! If nobody has told you or asked you or listened to you genuinely then let me flip my cape in the mud puddle so you can step across to a better side of the street. I care if you’re safe! I care if you’re happy! I hope you are safe. I hope you are happy. I hope you chase your dreams and in return they chase the hell out of you. Life is about reciprocation. Right? If not, why waste our time!

The game of cat and mouse is not forever fun if you’re always the mouse, huh?

I hope when you lay your sweet head on your pillow at night and drift off to a quiet slumber, I hope you can take a deep breath and let the day slowly slide out of your grasp as you prepare for another tomorrow. I hope you are in love. If you are not in love right now, I hope you feel loved, somehow, each day, genuinely. If you are not in love or feel loved, I hope you love yourself as you continue to help me and others hold the front lines of the most real battle this world will ever see.

I hope your life is everything you ever expected and more. I care about how many dings are in your shield considering how much sharper the arrows get with every passing year. I hope you smile at least three times a day. I hope you get tangled in a laughter, each and every day, that makes your forehead hurt. When you look in the mirror, I hope you see a beautiful, dirt covered warrior and not someone who is worthless and unimportant.

Why?

*I grin like a mischievous flawed hero*

“I think you know,” I reply.

*I wink*

“Because I care!”

I think to myself, I wonder when was the last time I…

I go ahead, cut myself off, and think,

… yeah, it was yesterday …

(oh, restless soul, why did you have to be a writer in this life?)

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*scene from the movie Breakfast Club*

“When you grow up, your heart dies…,” Allison Reynolds says.

She does not want to admit this but she does anyway.

“Who cares!” Bender exclaims.

He does not make eye contact with her when he replies. He is hardened by his own life story and does not want to feel any kind of heartfelt emotion.

“I care,” Allison answers as tears continue to fill the corner of her eyes.

Her emotional break moves the group.

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