One of my problems with flying time is most likely one of my own making. I am up and around in the early morning hours and therefore the next day comes quicker for me than it does for the lazy stay-in-bed folks who rise at ten a.m. Does this make sense to you? Well, it would if you were up and reading this before six a.m. at least. Its December 28th at least six to ten hours sooner for me than it is for you. Add another three hours if you’re on the west coast, and I’m half a day ahead of you. I think of things like this and could easily fall deep into a madness that’s threatened me since my freshman year in public high school when I escaped from the world of nuns and the only thing to fear was the devil hiding in the bathroom.
Education can be scary. I learned just enough about stoicism back then to misconstrue its deeper meaning and use it to ruin several years of feeling life. High school courses are very different now, I’m sure, but well-rounded used to mean a week of this and a week of that, with little encouragement to dig deeper. Adolescents are notorious for clinging to exotic theories in their struggle to find themselves—somewheres between being just like everyone else and being totally different than everyone else which is a broad range in which to lose oneself. I leaned towards different from everyone, family and friends alike. Unfortunately, I didn’t develop guts until I was well into my thirties, so there was a long period of time in which I floundered around in different personalities that still rise to the forefront now and then. Perhaps my most honest and real self is the written one. Or maybe its just the favorite child, I’m not sure. But there isn’t the tendency to extremism here that I may have under control in my daily life just because I’m not free and single to act out anymore. Bummer. It used to be fun sometimes.
Education isn’t scary to me anymore, though. With some degree of self-confidence in my own intelligence and experience, I do not as willingly accept what is being learned as irrefutable dogma—but mind you, I don’t challenge it as the younger students do. I just can’t waste time and mental energy on questioning why sixty seconds make up a minute just for the sake of argument and self-validation as a thinker and revolutionary. Some things you learn to accept. Some things you don’t. And you can always keep it a secret as to which way you believe.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology