Cursive and the Matrix

When Sharpies are brand new and still have all their juices, they glide across paper cups in a way that makes me want to start writing in cursive. In third grade we were told that our days of lifting our pencils between letters would be gone forever. Even after the days when you believed you would one day live a gratifying life as an astronaut or a ballerina, surely your third grade teacher wasn't capable of lying. I always imagined that some children learned about dishonesty looking out a foggy window at the rain, realizing their father, who rarely even paid child support, wasn't going to show up as promised.

People will order diet soda and skinny lattes before they will opt for matcha. And of course, as an employee, its not quite appropriate to share a negative opinion of any product your employer sells. If it weren't for our internal desire to form bonds with other humans, most of our jobs could surely be done by a machine. It sometimes seems that there is little separating man from man-made.

I once believed that I must learn all I could about the technology which is now intertwined with our first-world culture. I felt that it could surpass and manipulate me if I did not grasp its inner-workings. Although it still seems suspicious that only a small percentage of people understand the technology used by millions every day, I have written it off as just another element of the Matrix.

The red pill slid swiftly down my throat and into my lungs. It allowed me to see fractals from the perspective of God. Knowledge can feel alienating. The very thing responsible for keeping children indoors on adderall is quite possibly the most useful tool for connecting misfits and educating a curiosity that is conditioned out of us in grade school.

Independance and Belonging

I'm beginning to realize there's more opportunities surrounding me than I ever would have thought. The only thing I feel is holding me back is that I lack the confidence and sociability to attend these events I'm strongly in support of, if I cannot find a friend willing to attend with me. It's stupid, because I know that within these occasions lies opportunity to connect with like-minded people, while supporting a cause I believe in. I have this constant worry consisting of an image of myself, alone in a crowd of people, alienated and unable to make social connections.

This is somewhat reflective of my detached Aquarius-like relationship with society, to which I feel I do not belong. Popular ideas often to not set well with me, such as in preference of  music and entertainment, my outlook on the traditional American diet and my political opinions. While I know I am not alone in feeling this way, I'm also unskilled in small-talk. It doesn't seem quite socially acceptable to go up to strangers who appear to be like-minded, and ask them their favorite band or their opinion on modern agriculture.

However, I know there are things in life I'm going to have to do alone, and as much as that scares me, I also recognize that its necessary to achieve my goals and for my soul to grow. There is joy in much more than human interaction, but the desire to belong is evolutionarily engrained into us. I just hope I can figure out how to satisfy both sides of my constantly conflicting mind.