I feel like I am in a different place...
So Daytona is still the same. The people are still dull, boring, ambitionless; trying so hard to make their lives seem like something, without actually trying to make their lives anything at all.
The buildings are still the same old, run-down ones, even those in nice areas. All lack basics: paint, a few new bricks. Love, perhaps. Care.
The streets are still overcrowded, not with people, but with whites and blacks. With racism. Hatred. Ignorance. And not only acceptance of such prejudices, but celebration. Because we're white, and we are smarter and better than black. Because we are black, and we have more life experience, know more about the world. Not because we are individuals. Not because we are people.
I have accepted this, this jagged hole known as Daytona Beach, where the sun shines daily yet the sky seems forever dull. I do not like it. I do not approve. I do not agree. But I accept that this is what it is, and that is all- no more to it.
I have even accepted the depression that comes with such surroundings.
However, I am happy now, with little rays of light breaking through the cloud, much like in those paintings in which the light breaks through the grey sky to symbolize God's existence, and does he not exist in all of us? Because if I have to believe in something, I think I want to believe in myself. Thus, am I not God? And then, aren't you? Because I believe in you! my heart screams. I know that we can exist, and I know that we can exist however we choose to.
So I have realized that it is not Daytona that is changing, but that it is I. More mature? Perhaps. Maybe just better informed. I knew it existed, but like a foreigner thrust into a new language, this is the only way to learn the tongue correctly, first hand. It is hard at first, and you always think in your native language, but eventually you come to understand the other ones, as well.
Everything looks different, it is the same. Everyone seems different, their ambitions never change. But I am not everyone. You are not, either. Because we, sweet loves, are God.
The buildings are still the same old, run-down ones, even those in nice areas. All lack basics: paint, a few new bricks. Love, perhaps. Care.
The streets are still overcrowded, not with people, but with whites and blacks. With racism. Hatred. Ignorance. And not only acceptance of such prejudices, but celebration. Because we're white, and we are smarter and better than black. Because we are black, and we have more life experience, know more about the world. Not because we are individuals. Not because we are people.
I have accepted this, this jagged hole known as Daytona Beach, where the sun shines daily yet the sky seems forever dull. I do not like it. I do not approve. I do not agree. But I accept that this is what it is, and that is all- no more to it.
I have even accepted the depression that comes with such surroundings.
However, I am happy now, with little rays of light breaking through the cloud, much like in those paintings in which the light breaks through the grey sky to symbolize God's existence, and does he not exist in all of us? Because if I have to believe in something, I think I want to believe in myself. Thus, am I not God? And then, aren't you? Because I believe in you! my heart screams. I know that we can exist, and I know that we can exist however we choose to.
So I have realized that it is not Daytona that is changing, but that it is I. More mature? Perhaps. Maybe just better informed. I knew it existed, but like a foreigner thrust into a new language, this is the only way to learn the tongue correctly, first hand. It is hard at first, and you always think in your native language, but eventually you come to understand the other ones, as well.
Everything looks different, it is the same. Everyone seems different, their ambitions never change. But I am not everyone. You are not, either. Because we, sweet loves, are God.