My fabulous dinner of olives, sardines, l’il smokies and Snyder’s Pumpernickel ‘n’ Onion Pretzels (the fact that my boyfriend lives in Europe allows me the freedom to consume such a meal without shamefacedly banning myself from the bed for the remainder of the night… no amount of Colgate or Banaca could ease the suffering I would be putting my Cabana Boy through otherwise) prefaces the following thoughts:

1. Why the hell, after eating that kind of food, am I making a point to drink low-cal organic tea?

2. How exactly am I going to hit my parents with the fact that we (Cabana Boy and myself) are seriously looking into viable options that allow me to move to Belgium this coming January, rather than in a year and a half when I am/was due to complete my masters degree? (and yes I am intentionally posting this statement in a place where my parents may offhandedly stumble across it before I think of a good way to tell them. Confrontation is so much easier when mom calls on the phone and starts off with, “Daddy and I read your blog last night….” as opposed to me bumbling through dinner looking like I’m about to hurl and reassuring them that I’m feeling fine right up until the point where I say, “So, um, yeah, you know all those plans that I’ve been putting together for the past year or two? Fuck ‘em, I’m moving to Belgium, like, now.”)

2a. Now I’m just scrolling up and smugly drooling over my mastery of parentheticals.

3. Here’s the biggy though- today in class one of the topics we discussed was personal beliefs that we hold near and dear to our hearts; some tidbit or axiom, if you will, that we live our life by. This was mine: I honestly believe that if everyone did something good and positive every day, that we could change this shitstorm of a world that we live in. If one person would just let a pedestrian cross the street in the rain, even if their light is green and they’re running late, or pay the change for the person in front of them who is getting flustered and digging in their wallet for pennies - if everyone would do something small like that every day, I really think things could get better. Idealistic, I know, but just listen. On the way to the airport to pick up Cabana Boy last month, I was stuck in bumper to bumper traffic in godawful heat that made inhaling feel akin to huffing magma. I needed to get into the middle lane from the left and no one would let me in. So I sat there, sweat seeping from every pore on my skin, feeling angry and miserable while people behind me honked and glared and people to the right of me smirked like barring my entry to their lane was the most satisfying thing they had done that week. When suddenly, a young woman about my age in a dark Accord let me into the lane. I was so thankful to her and kept glancing in my rear view as traffic inched ahead and I felt truly bad when I saw how frustrated she looked sitting in that traffic. After about a half hour, I looked back and she was singing in the car (I’d been doing that the whole time. It’s the only place I really ever feel natural singing). Well damn if I didn’t smile and start singing louder! It made me sincerely happy to see that, with Carmageddon going on all around us, this nice person who allowed me a simple car-length of space in front of her was able to kick back and somehow find a way to enjoy the traffic in the exact same way I did. She let every car with a turn signal on get in front of her…and I did too. All of a sudden keeping my spot in the neverending line of vehicles on the parkway just didn’t seem as important anymore.

My generation is one of the most apathetic I think the world has ever seen. Nobody seems to care about the general welfare of others unless it’s trendy or they get some kind of reward for it. And the things we do dislike we neglect to change. We have no real issue or cause that we take a stand against. We have no revolutionaries, no visionaries, no one standing up and leading a fight for something right and genuinely good. We are beaten down by a sickening sense of helplessness and apathy in the face of the horrors that go on around us every day. So, if we can’t muster the sense of strength and indignant righteousness needed for something as massive as, say, civil rights or bringing troops home from the war, perhaps we can start small. Maybe it will lead to something bigger or maybe not, but let it never be said that we didn’t at least try. As it is so accurately stated in one of my favorite movies, The Boondock Saints: “Now, we must all fear evil men. But there is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men”.

So I’ll leave you with that sentiment on this fine summer evening, loyal readers. Take care and try to do something nice tomorrow.