Versions of Life

"I'm asking you, of all possible versions of your life, why have you chosen this one?"
~Oliver in The Myth of You and Me by Leah Stewart

I'm telling you, it all just seemed to happen. It didn't seem like I chose anything. I'm not saying that I'm a victim of my own life. I'm saying that; my life seems to flow in a positive way, towards most of what I need and want.

The Myth of You and Me

"I watched as my best friend abandoned me. I felt what it was to be negated in that way, and I understood that if hatred can negate us, love can create us, and when we lose it we don't know who we are."
~Cameron in The Myth of You and Me by Leah Stewart

We met in Sunday School when our family moved to Vancouver. I was 7 years old. We didn't become close friends until we were 11. I'm not sure why. We attended different schools, so at first we only saw each other at church on Sundays and Wednesday nights for Girls' Club. We were best friends.

We have been through so much together since then: family illnesses, baptisms, first boyfriends, parent/teen misunderstandings, dating the guy she liked (I didn't know she liked him that much), pranking at summer camp, bible school, engagements, weddings, being youth leaders, having babies, miscarriages, guardians for each others children...

I remember being in a bible study group years ago, trying, with difficulty, to explain my thoughts on a particular doctrine or spiritual discipline and wishing she were there because she would understand me completely. She was with me when so much of my spirituality was developing.

Since then, she has kept on the high road, what I consider fanaticism, (some would call main stream Christianity). Our religious beliefs are so far apart now that I don't know if we could ever be close again. We are estranged. So much of our connection in the past had to do with our deep religious beliefs and our straight-laced code of ethics, I think. Our love for each other was couched in our love for the Lord. I have slowly walked away from main stream Christianity, (not without bouts of identity crisis), and our relationship couldn't handle the strain. Possibly the reason we couldn't hold on to each other is because of our honesty. I can't do Christianity her way and she believes it's the only way. She goes to foreign countries to proselytize and I can't get past the arrogance that conveys, nor the damage that proselytizing has done historically to many peoples.

I miss her; my best friend of the past. I miss the part about 'changing the world, being different, standing up for what is right, advocating for those who are marginalized', together. What if I called her up and we went for fair trade hot chocolate and discussed our "ethical addictions". It could be the start of a better world, or at the very least, a better me and a better she.

The Black Prince

"We ignore what we are doing until it is too late to alter it. We never allow ourselves quite to focus upon moments of decision; and these are often in fact hard to find even if we are searching for them. We allow the vague pleasure-seeking annoyance-avoiding tide of our being to hurry us onward until the moment when we announce that we can no other..."
"How human responsibility is possible at all could well puzzle an extra-galactic student of this weird method of proceeding through time."...
"...in most cases the rag-bag of consciousness is only unified by the experience of great art or of intense love..."
~Bradley Pearson in Iris Murdoch's novel- The Black Prince.

It's a rather cynical way to look at humans. Although, there is this thread of hope with the part about "great art" and "intense love"

"Pleasure-seeking", "annoyance-avoiding"; is this what motivates us? Is this all there is to it? As a whole, is humankind this self-centred? If we were completely honest with ourselves, would we be able to come up with altruistic motives for anything that we do?

I'm on this pleasure-seeking track right now, but I wouldn't say it was vague. It is with intention. I have a few friends and family members who have cancer. My own mortality is constantly staring me in the face. Living in the beautiful moments and seeking fun, living intensely is what I'm all about these days. When things aren't fun, when things are irritating, I want to avoid them with all my might. There is nothing vague about it. Someone said to me that since my head injury, I have become more self-centered. So be it. I will be self-centered responsibly, with intensity and integrity.