bliumchik | Shading Lightly Violet Prose

Why do people group other people by their opinions? Is it because certain types of opinion tend to go togther? Well, have a good think about which opinions apply to the box you're putting somebody in. Decent, upstanding citizens think girls these days are wearing their jeans too low - so what? So does the drunk bum who was sitting at my bus stop in The Hole That Is Maroubra stinking of alcohol and muttering derogatory things about chop suey. Does that mean you can group those people together? yes, but not in the way everyoby does! One tiny facet of your personality can make you vastly different from the next person - I mean come on, if 1% of DNA difference can make humans out of monkeys, veriation in objectives and reactions has gotta be pretty insignificant in comparison.

Who we are is made up of so many tiny little things, all added together, and if one were slightly different then we would not be who we are. It doesn't matter if that one is a genetic coincidence or an event in your childhood, they all count. You may share 85% of your opinions with somebody - that does not mean you can automatically assume they are like you. Maybe they arrived at the same conclusions via completely different experiences and believe what they do for completely different reasons. Maybe two beliefs YOU think go hand in hand are vastly different in their mind.

I thought of all this as my bus left the bearded alcoholic behind and went on it's merry way in the general direction of La Perouse, and I realised the only reason that we don't understand that everyone is an individual unlike any other is that we don't see those tiny little details that make all the difference. Just as we couldn't POSSIBLY be related to monkeys before, when we couldn't see the genetic pattern. Everyone is unique, and alone, yet not alone. We see the outcomes, which have only a limited range, and we don't think about the first and final causes at all, or hardly ever.

And then I got off the bus and walked home, and the air smelled of prawns, and as I looked up, the sky shone pink through the almost bare branches of the one tree on my block that understands what autumn means, and I wished I could see Odessa in November, when they're all like this. So I picked up a leaf and I took it home ~~and I named it Larry~~. It smells like Autumn.

Todays link: http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=583&e=8&u=/nm/20050610/od_nm/cat_fire_dc