Bowling for Humans

You know it’s probably my fault...I’ve just never learned how to love.  And what am I doing here, sitting among people I seem to talk with endlessly but have never really met? I wonder if we’ll ever meet.  And really, how many people have I actually “met”? How many people have I really and truly “met” in the course of my life? How many people could I actually relate to as something more than a bag of bones, a face, a name, and a relatively short and meaningless conversation about...well, I don’t really remember, it was a long time ago.

What does it say about me, when I can visit Moscow, stay there for three months totally immersed in a different language, culture and alphabet and still feel completely at home even though I couldn’t carry on a decent conversation with anyone or anything? But I guess decent conversations are few and far between even at the best of times.

I’m weird, what can I say? And I don’t blame you, really, if you unilaterally decide to give me a wide berth and walk on by, politely averting your gaze, as my sombre form trundles along on its lonely road to who knows where.  I know you have better things to do than to stick around and try to figure me out, better things to do than try to unravel this chain, tear off this disguise, break down this not so grand facade, and uncover the human being that lies beneath the all the shit, all the shit that piles on top of us from the day we are born until the day we die.  You just don’t have the time.  You have your own road, your own insecurities, anxieties and hang-ups from living in a society that encourages us not to bother.  You got your own shit to deal with, and at this momentary cross-roads in time I can’t blame you for not wanting to bother with mine, shit, after all, does tend to stink.

The moment passes and you walk on toward some unseen horizon, silently passing judgement on my insignificant role in your life.  And so I am destined to remain a stranger, even though I am your neighbour I am consigned to a state of invisibility.  So we take the easy way out, as so many of us do so often, go our separate ways and alone try to keep the wolves at bay for one more night, try to hold out for just another 24 rounds of mortal combat, hoping against hope for our own personal messiah to show their beautiful face and rescue us from this world, from this country, from this city, from this family, from ourselves.

Divided we stand, like pins before a bowling ball, just waiting for our time to fall.  We wait, consuming our minds with ten thousand different distractions as we try to not think about that inevitable, final impact.  It always comes, no matter how much we wish it away with booze and fairy-tales.  And as the bough breaks and the cradle falls, perhaps we’ll finally realize the one truth that we “strong” and “independent” adults so fanatically deny: we either live together or we die alone.