New Year
So it's 2005. It sounds weird, but I didn't realize it until I was looking at a list of shows a band had and they were all in "05” This the time of year that everyone is kind of forced to a reevaluation; to look at everything in their life and decide where they're doing well and where they need work. It’s weird that a couple of numbers changing makes us take stock of our lives. For me, I wonder how I got where I am now, how I got from any point in the past to now.
When I was very little I went to this school that had all the different grades’ classrooms sequentially lined up next to one another, pre kindergarten to 1st grade. I walked by those classrooms everyday, going and coming from class. One day I noticed that as the grades got higher, the rooms changed: they became drabber, less playful, more work-oriented, and less fun. It really bothered me. It still bothers me. Who would want to leave that colorful playful room? Who would want to grow up when it’s so great being a Toys R Us kid?
Flash to now. Classrooms are sterile. Toys R Us is bankrupt. What kind of kids are we now? I mean it was a stupid saying to begin with; why would you feed kids some ideal that you know it's impossible? Why even put into their heads that their classrooms are always going to be lively, that all peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are going to have their crusts cut off, that good things stay good and bad things eventually become good. Why neglect that change?
I think that’s why I like the line “well I guess this is growing up” from “Dammit” so much. Because what is this growing up? People talk about growing up a lot, but what the hell is it? Everyone does it incredibly differently, how can you even classify it as the same thing? What if someone is in the process of “growing up” does something stupid and dies. Or what happens when you see bad aspects of your parents in yourself? How are you personally growing up and making decisions if you’re adopting bad traits of your parents? How are you growing up if you keep making the same wrong decisions? You are doing it all the time, but we call it different things: stress, obstacles, adversity, relationships, fun, experience, choices and change. How many of these things are really just you stumbling on the way to the next classroom? Every now and then something happens to me and it really makes me feel. I mean really feel. Not good not bad, but just like there’s a real connection between what’s inside me and what’s going on around me. I almost died a year ago yesterday. Died. Ended. Thrown into nothingness. No more growing up. No more anything. It should have been life-altering. I should have walked away from the experience changed. On that New Year’s Eve of all of them I should have reevaluated. You know what I did? I pretended to look scared so the cop would think I was really shaken and wouldn’t be stupid anymore. Why didn’t that make me feel? I was so cool and calm and collected when I was talking to my parents it was disgusting. This is me being a stupid little boy. This is me not understanding. This is me being emotionally void when I should be feeling and passionate when I shouldn’t feel anything.
I made a lot of mistakes last year. I did a lot of things correctly. But I don’t feel good or bad about 2004. I see no net gain or loss. I don’t find myself any better this January 1st than I did last January 1st. I’m still in the same classroom. The last time I left a classroom for this drabber one things only got worse. But I can’t stay in this classroom: either I’ve changed it or it has changed me, but it doesn’t feel right anymore. And I know I can’t go back. It’s a paradox: I know which way is back but I can’t seem to find forward. Well, I guess that’s growing up.
When I was very little I went to this school that had all the different grades’ classrooms sequentially lined up next to one another, pre kindergarten to 1st grade. I walked by those classrooms everyday, going and coming from class. One day I noticed that as the grades got higher, the rooms changed: they became drabber, less playful, more work-oriented, and less fun. It really bothered me. It still bothers me. Who would want to leave that colorful playful room? Who would want to grow up when it’s so great being a Toys R Us kid?
Flash to now. Classrooms are sterile. Toys R Us is bankrupt. What kind of kids are we now? I mean it was a stupid saying to begin with; why would you feed kids some ideal that you know it's impossible? Why even put into their heads that their classrooms are always going to be lively, that all peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are going to have their crusts cut off, that good things stay good and bad things eventually become good. Why neglect that change?
I think that’s why I like the line “well I guess this is growing up” from “Dammit” so much. Because what is this growing up? People talk about growing up a lot, but what the hell is it? Everyone does it incredibly differently, how can you even classify it as the same thing? What if someone is in the process of “growing up” does something stupid and dies. Or what happens when you see bad aspects of your parents in yourself? How are you personally growing up and making decisions if you’re adopting bad traits of your parents? How are you growing up if you keep making the same wrong decisions? You are doing it all the time, but we call it different things: stress, obstacles, adversity, relationships, fun, experience, choices and change. How many of these things are really just you stumbling on the way to the next classroom? Every now and then something happens to me and it really makes me feel. I mean really feel. Not good not bad, but just like there’s a real connection between what’s inside me and what’s going on around me. I almost died a year ago yesterday. Died. Ended. Thrown into nothingness. No more growing up. No more anything. It should have been life-altering. I should have walked away from the experience changed. On that New Year’s Eve of all of them I should have reevaluated. You know what I did? I pretended to look scared so the cop would think I was really shaken and wouldn’t be stupid anymore. Why didn’t that make me feel? I was so cool and calm and collected when I was talking to my parents it was disgusting. This is me being a stupid little boy. This is me not understanding. This is me being emotionally void when I should be feeling and passionate when I shouldn’t feel anything.
I made a lot of mistakes last year. I did a lot of things correctly. But I don’t feel good or bad about 2004. I see no net gain or loss. I don’t find myself any better this January 1st than I did last January 1st. I’m still in the same classroom. The last time I left a classroom for this drabber one things only got worse. But I can’t stay in this classroom: either I’ve changed it or it has changed me, but it doesn’t feel right anymore. And I know I can’t go back. It’s a paradox: I know which way is back but I can’t seem to find forward. Well, I guess that’s growing up.