Human Nature

Its 8am and I have already been on campus for an hour and a half. DH has an hard deadline coming up and needed to get to work early. I could have driven myself, but I figured it might be good for me to have more time at school, and parking is no picnic without a parking pass.

I just finished reading my book club book, The HERetics Daughter. I did not realize that the title had strange capitalization until just now, which certainly gives it additional meaning. Its about the Salem witch trials. As that topic would suggest, its less than cheerful, especially when one is already a cynic, prone to skepticism depression concerning human nature. I have never given way to full out misanthropy, but I know how one could end up there. Anyways, I was reading this book at my Grandma's last night, and mentioned to her and my other relatives how depressing it was. My Grandma's response was "aren't you glad you did not live in that time period," to which my all to jaded response was, "yes, but humans still do things this to each other now, though they don't tend to call it witchcraft." My cousin said, at least we don't burn people. I am sure I could find recent cases where people have burned each other. The recent anti-immigrant riots in South Africa come to mind. And, if your thinking "oh, but that's a savage third world country, we don't do stuff like that in America, read about Marcello Lucero's murder in New York City, where a group of teens set out to "kill a Mexican" (Lucero was Ecuadorian, but this differentiation did not save him from hate and prejudice). Of course, he was not burned to death, but Aaron Taylor, a homeless man in L.A. was. I know, I am a cynic. But the worst thing, the most depressing thing about the The HERetics Daughter, or the Salem witch trials in general, is not that they were horrible in and of themselves, which they were, its that this sort of crap goes on all the time in the world. People kill people, in the harshest ways possible. Humans can't just live in peace, they have to form groups, they have to hate someone, as if somehow that makes living more worthwhile. This is also my main complaint about the book. One of the "catch phrases" being used to advertise the story is "Life is not what you have, or what you can keep." The problem being, I take no message from the book of what life IS, besides perhaps suffering, which in my attempts to not give in to jadedness I cannot accept. Maybe someone at book club on Thursday will enlighten me as to another interpretation to take away. The alternative interpretation is probably about family and the parent-child relationship, but its hard to pay attention to that when much bigger things are thrown into question.

In another twist of fate, this very same morning I am thinking about all of these things, a mistake in my past is brought once again to light. I did not do many stupid or bad things during high school, I was a goody two shoes. (I can only hope my little sister is following in my footsteps in this regard). However, I was also an egotistical know it all, probably your typical teenager, and in my "infinite wisdom" I did some cruel things (I can only hope my little sister is not following in my footsteps in that regard). Not cruel like Carrie, but emotional cruelty to my friends. Strange, isn't it, that I can say that. How can I classify them as friends if I was so callous towards them? But I can, its the only way really to describe that time. Its as if I was looking for drama, or at least embracing it once it was thrust upon me. I did not want to be understood, I wanted to be utterly complex and misunderstood. Every time we had a new idea we thought it certainly was the right idea, no matter how many ideas we had were proven wrong. I have made my apologies for those years, at least all of them I know needed to be made, and learned a great deal from all of it. But I was reminded today that even though I have been forgiven and everyone has moved on, that our past shapes us, and what I did back then is still impacting people's lives, if only as a memory that haunts them. They say the teenage years are formative, and just as they were formative for me and I learned from my mistakes and observing those around me (I realized in 11th grade that the vast majority of drama in a person's life is self created, and this knowledge has served me well), but I also put a stamp on other people's formative years, a stamp I wish I could take back. Too late now, eh?

(PS - Don't feel bad for making me think about these things, its a truth of life, eh? And this post is a lot more pessimistic than I actually am.)