TEN

-10-

Back to this again. Where does it all end? Are we on an endless road that leads to nowhere? The Proverbial God is watching us, they say. Watching us do what, exactly? The God watches us continue to lead corruptive, lying, cheating, and bloodthirsty lives. Everything that goes on in today’s world is a matter of who can collect the most toys the fastest. Everyone is guilty of it. Patience is a virtue that has long been lost on the youth of today. Maybe even has started to spread beyond the youth, if you ask me. People cannot wait for things or do not have the drive and compassion to achieve said things. They want it now. If they don’t get it, they move on to the next person or thing. It doesn’t matter who gets hurt in the process, just as long as the end result is to their desire.

Do the ends really justify the means? In thine own eyes, ‘tis true, as the saying goes. That is the sole belief of the people achieving the greater end. The end is happiness. Complete and utter happiness. Happiness comes hand in hand with the belief of the Proverbial God. The ends and the means are both seen through the eyes of the beholder. One person’s happiness can often be another person’s melancholy. Death can be a closed door to one person and open another door in the belief of some. One person’s God can be another person’s Devil. The answers are all around us and we don’t take enough time to seek them out. Instead, we seek out the greed and lust and settle for what is already laid out before us. People might seek these answers if it were as easy as opening a box of Lucky Charms. Life would be that much easier because that’s what everyone is looking for. Instead of looking for life on other planets, maybe we as individuals should spend more time looking for life on the lovely planet Earth. I use the term lovely in a total sarcastic sense and of my own free will I state this. No bullshit aura of ego from this guy.

Two thousand plus years have passed and I’m still seeking the answers in life. Nine years have gone by since the arrival of the new millennium and the earth hasn’t exploded into a million particles, so I suppose that the answers are still around. The paranoia that surrounded that New Year’s Eve never came to fruition, as we all know, and we all moved on from that technological scare. Sure, we have our everyday fears that loom over us to this day, but the Y2K epidemic never materialized. Not that I ever bought into it or anything. I’d read Nostradamus and discovered a few of his predictions did come true. If you make thousands of predictions, a few are bound to come true from time to time. I enjoyed his writings, but never felt they were relevant to the millennium. Relevant to the end of times, but nothing I was too worried about. It wouldn’t have been that bad to live without computers. It might have been helpful, in fact, to get people back to connecting with one another instead of through technology. If you ask me, Twitter is the true signal to the end of times.

It would seem I had all of my answers at one point. Not less than a year ago, I had a wife, a child, and a good paying job. I had finally steadied my life. Except I had turned into the very sheep that I had fought desperately against. I had forgotten how to question and how to look for answers. My desire and quest for knowledge had taken a back seat to living the single tract life. I guess at one point it happens to the best of us. The part of my brain that I had blocked out all of those years ago seeped in and I settled. To me, I had found that meaning to things I had so desperately sought. The Holy Grail had been discovered and my life should have been complete. The horrible part is that I couldn’t let my mind rest. That Holy Grail might have well been a plastic version that you can buy from a vendor on the streets of Mexico. That is not the meaning of life, though.

The meaning of life lies not in the answer of a girl, but instead is found in that of friendship. Without friendship, all that is left is a good screw, which is good, yeah, but then who is there to discuss the important things like football, music and movies. Okay, maybe the girl has those qualities, but it’s not the same. Do you really want your girlfriend to be one of the guys? To an extent, maybe, but your girlfriend doesn’t need to know more about E.R.A. than your best friends do. It’s just not right.

Friends are on the top. Or at least they were at a point in my life. I was palling around with a tight group of friends at the time. I still believe that the meaning of life lies with friendship. It’s not found in religion, family, girls, money, or power. Everything boils down to who you know and your relationship to them. Keep your friends close to your heart. Don’t trample on them for the love of a girl. Without a tight circle of friends, who is there to watch you’re back? No one. Being alone and deserted in life is not a good way to live. I’ve been there and am back again. I’ve been full circle and have nothing to show for it. Friendship is wherein the meaning lies. I cannot stress that enough.

So here I am. Or there I was, for that matter. Life was slowly starting to come together after twenty-one years. School was enjoyable. I had a good girl, and after waiting for over twenty years, the friends I had so desperately sought were by my side. Who would have thought that it would have been so simple? Well, no one should ever think like that. Life is never that easy and simple. Not then and especially not now. There are always questions out there and the 21st century would prove to be no different. Friendships are built to last and one fact always remains: Girls ruin it all.