jejune

I don’t know if anyone’s said something similar already. I don’t keep up on things of this nature. But I’ve learned something in my short existence:

change is sudden; maturity is gradual.

Maturity is typically defined by being full grown or fully developed. This is a very broad definition applied to an even broader concept. What’s to say someone is fully developed? Physiological growth and psychological growth are almost mutually exclusive.

In early stages of life, physical and mental growth happens along a relatively common time line. A child walks, on average, at thirteen months, are using vowel and consonant sounds by one year, and able to use a toilet by thirty months. But once instinctual and habitual activities are firmly within a child’s grasp their development forks sharply. The development of the mind doesn’t necessarily proceed at the same rate as the body. The pace of each is determined largely by environmental factors. How, with no scientific basis, do I know this? People around me.

Maturity, in my mind is characterized by the ability to approach a problem with reason. A mature person should be able to interact with others that have conflicting views without discomfort or aggression. A mature person may not know their faults, but accepts that they exist. A mature person keeps an open mind to opposition while articulating his or her beliefs. A mature person is sociable and polite with concern for others. A mature person realizes a need to be selfish in some situations, but strives to avoid it when unnecessary. A mature person can see past the day to day routine in favor of a bigger picture of who he or she wants to be in the future.

I’m not mature. This is pretty evident upon meeting me, but I believe i do have a leg up on most of the people my age. I can say this for many reasons, but it mostly derives from my acceptance that I’m not the only one on this planet. That’s a concept that most admit to having, but in practice have trouble adapting to. It takes the right set of factors for someone to develop to that level.

Things cannot be handed to you upon request. The value of the dollar can not be an abstract figure of speech. Along those lines, money is not something to be flaunted. Respect for others must be inherent. A general knowledge of the greater society is almost necessary. You can not be brought up to believe you are better than the masses; because you’re not.

A pitfall of many is conversation. To have a general knowledge of many things is better than to have a great knowledge of one thing. To limit your own conversation to a small set of items makes you less interesting and leaves you less interested. This will immediately leave you out of many situations. To have passion about a small number of things is unavoidable and ideal. Without passion there is no reason for living and without it you will not be able to grow in important areas.

Another is prestige through consumerism. This is extremely common around me and one of the most despicable of human traits. The ability to impress with monetary value is something that’s passed on from the wealthy and striven for by the poor. It is a worthless enterprise, but a popular one. In the same line of thought, to have money and to claim otherwise is deceptive and immediately renders you untrustworthy while you may think it’s a way to relate.

The third reason persons my age are, by nature, immature is the lack of common generosity. The compassion is fading and thus personal growth is stunted. Everyone needs someone at different points throughout their journey. Too many expect things to be owed to them. They are selfish and unreliable until they are in need of assistance. Animosity grows and, as a result, they are left with shallow relationships of little value.

So why are so many who are physically mature so far behind psychologically? In my opinion it’s a child’s parents giving them the impression they are precious. They are; every child is important, but to instill this belief at an early age is dangerous. The habits and beliefs developed at a young age have a way of staying strong throughout their lives. Money becomes more valuable than social interaction and thus a certain level of depth is forfeited.

When it comes to maturity I have much to learn, but I’ve gone through changes. I’ve made the transition from high school moron to floundering employee. I’ve had many relationships that had incredible effects on me. I’ve moved into a new state away from most of the friends I had. I’ve blacked out and stolen a car. I’ve had internal bleeding and cheated death by about a quarter inch. These have all had a profound and sudden impact, but the maturity that grew from them came with time.

There are people close to me who are at the point of physical maturity who have the social maturity of a kid in seventh grade. There are people around me who have had many more experiences than I have who still act like a freshman in college. There are others who have barely left their bubble and yet have more depth than I may ever have. Of course I’m annoyed when associating with someone who’s a social adolescent, in the same way that they would be by a child crying in the supermarket after being denied Zebra Cakes. There is a sliding scale.

So why do we claim a man can go to war at eighteen, drive a car at sixteen, yet not drink until twenty-one? Because it’s easy. It’s easy to say someone at a certain age is ready for these things. It may be based on gross generalities, but as an alternative to intuitive testing it’s extremely attractive. Until they can find a way to quickly and efficiently determine mental maturity there will be those with responsibilities they are not ready or willing to accept.

That, apparently, is just how things go.

relations

I don’t want to be the guy who’s with the girl because he needs her, I want to be the guy who’s with the girl because he wants her.

It’s an interesting quote from one of the most poignant characters of Saved!, played by Macaulay Culkin. It’s odd how rare it is to find what he’s looking for. In my experience—which is admittedly infantile—the likelihood of finding such an arrangement is about one in six. Those aren’t good odds in most respects, especially in the intimate area of relations.

Why is that? Because almost all relationships grow because of convenience, pressure, or security. The fact that most relationships spring from mutual attraction makes that seem peculiar. But how many relationships do you know survive the transition out of infatuation without becoming uninteresting or monotonous? A solid relationship can have aspects of all three, but when the scale tips from desire to routine, things can become unhealthy.

Convenience is the most unfortunate of the three factors that keep an unhealthy pair together. There’s a mutual lack of effort to grow apart. After some time, couples plan vacations together, live together, share furniture, share pets, and have mutual friends. These are all invariably difficult to disorganize and partition later on. To avoid discomfort is much like the instinct to survive. Some have more than others, but everyone has a bit of both. A desperate man cutting his arm at the wrist with a rusted pocket knife is much like a woman staying in a loveless relationship to avoid loneliness. It is always easier to stay with someone uninteresting than to take the risk of not finding something better with someone else.

The strongest factor is pressure. It’s broad and can be multifaceted. It’s hard to ignore even in the healthiest of couplings. Pressure can come from parents, friends, the significant other, society, progeny, or internal beliefs. While men feel similar pressures to some degree, women are most effected by them. There is a double standard between single men and single women. There is the infamous biological clock. There is the preconceived notion of the “spinster.”

All of these—or even just a few—will keep someone in an unhealthy relationship much longer than they should. People tend to put more weight on opinions of others than their own inclinations. Based on outside influence, some will stay with someone they’re not interested in because they think they are good for them. It’s hard to make the leap into single from a relationship that looks healthy to others whose opinions you favor.

Security is the most underestimated factor. There is a sense of belonging that comes with a relationship. Not only do you have someone to do things with, but you can do things with other couples that you were previously excluded from—or were uncomfortable being included in. Being single can be hard because relationships come with a certain assurance that you were able to find someone. The feeling of having someone will keep people with anyone if they don’t have the strength to be alone.

Relationships can grow just as quickly out of mutual respect and adoration. Those are harder to sustain because these factors can easily diminish or be lost. The comfort of having someone is strong, and usually outweighs the disinterest. This creates relationships where participants grow together rather than grow. Compromise is healthy and necessary in all interaction, but too much compromise can leave someone feeling lost or despondent.

That’s why the quote above is so profound. In it’s context it’s thoughtful and strong. Culkin’s character is bound to a wheelchair. His reliance on someone is a necessary evil of his disability. But when I heard it, I could immediately relate. Even with physical independence I hope for the same ideal. I want a relationship that’s built on the desire to be with someone, not the avoidance of loneliness. I find relationships augmented from mutual distaste for loneliness to be pathetic and unfortunate. But they are very common and their number will only increase as i age.

Relationships are notoriously hard to maintain, and that’s why everyone should strive to be with someone they adore. If you’re younger than twenty-seven, still out of parenthood, and in a relationship because you can’t handle being single: I can only look down on you. Maybe it’s because I’ve—at least currently—found something closely resembling my ideal. Or maybe it’s because I’ve never factored the affection of another into my self-worth.

My advice—even if taken with a grain of salt—is to find someone you want to be with as much as possible. To stay with someone you’re not interested in is only a waste of your own time. The strongest relationships involve someone you can’t live without. The most common relationships involve someone you’re afraid to live without.

familiar

She wears odd outfits. Usually shorts, with old or oddly sized t-shirts. She’s brunette with a couple tattoos showcased on her calves. She has a large yellow messenger bag that rides high on her back. To get in and out of it she loosens the strap with a pull, her hands dart around her pockets, and then she tightens it again with another swift tug. She reads sometimes. She has a couple pairs of socks with print—sometimes-witty remarks—on them. Her bike is old, probably older than I am, with padded tape along the two crossbars. The wheels are old, but seem durable. The pedals are that of serious bikers, with the snap-in-place footing. She hangs her U-lock on her seat when she places it in the vertical bike rack. She has a Nextel radio that beeps periodically. She gets on at Forty-Sixth street northbound and off at Nicollet Avenue. She shares the train with me both directions.

He’s older, with a beard. He listens to music—or at least I think it’s music—on his Blackberry-type phone for the entire ride. He typically stands directly inside whichever door he enters. He doesn’t dress formally, and normally wears cargo-style pants. His hair appears disheveled. His gaze wanders around the car unless he’s changing options on the phone. His glasses reflect the sunlight when he stands on the right of the car on the southbound trip. He exits southbound at Fiftieth Street.

He’s younger than I am, with a backpack. He usually dresses in a t-shirt with jeans. He has dark hair and a tuft of hair on his chin. He doesn’t sit. He gets on northbound at Franklin Avenue. He looks around every time he enters. He watches people from time to time.

She reads the entire time she’s on the train. She’s attractive with a perpetual smirk. She usually wears heels about three inches tall. She alternates between her hairs up in a ponytail and her hair down. Gets on southbound at Nicollet Avenue. She finds places to sit.

Her hair is blonde to the point of bright. She dresses smart. She listens to her iPod religiously. She looks around at first, but settles into reading quickly and looks up quickly only when the doors open. She sits in the first set of chairs next to the doors she enters. She has a small black bag. She enters southbound at Nicollet Avenue.

He enters northbound at Fiftieth Street. He wears sneakers with slacks and carries a red and grey backpack. He listens to ear-bud headphones.

He smokes on the walk from where he parks his black Ford pick-up. He stops at the edge of the platform to finish. He’s taller with gray thinning hair. He dresses in a plaid zip-up hooded fleece even on the coldest days. He’s heavy-set. He walks slowly, but steadily. He enters northbound at Fiftieth Street and southbound at Nicollet Avenue. He almost always stands.

She stands only about five and one-half foot tall, but her hair stands another five inches. It’s dark and thinning, but great effort has been put into its vertical prominence. She carries a large bag. She enters northbound at Fiftieth. She waits patiently in the second Plexiglas enclosure until the train becomes visible. Then she walks ten feet to the south to wait again for the closest set of doors to open. She almost always sits.

They are similar in stature, both shorter and stocky. His hair is thinning, but he’s left it to grow to below his shoulder blades on the sides and back. Her hair is only slightly longer, but a shade lighter. They wear matching bags, hers redder and his more yellow. The bags are large and made up of a heavy woven material left over from the grunge era. There is a zipper along the only strap and they hang low. They enter northbound at Thirty-Eighth Street and he exits at the Metrodome. They hug and kiss affectionately before he gets off. They stand directly in whichever doorway they enter.

These people are familiar. I don’t know their names. I don’t know their stories. But I see them frequently in the mornings or evenings. They wear different clothes, have different hairstyles, and stand or sit in different places, but they’re still familiar. It’s almost comforting.

There is a general rule that seems to accompany the rail. Like an elevator, conversation among strangers is frowned upon. A polite “good morning,” or “excuse me,” is all that’s necessary or allowed. It’s not necessarily unfriendly, but friendliness is only out of obligation. Recognition and acquaintance are distinct and separate associations, and the difference is very clear on the tracks.

They are just a few faces in a sea of faces. They are part of a routine. Part of a schedule. Part of the herd.

utiliships

We live in a selfish time. Children have been groomed to take their considerations first and to have little respect for the views or existence of others. There are many places this is evident, but friendships and the somewhat intimate relationships that develop therein, are an interesting example.

A friend has become more a resource than a confidant. It’s more about what a friend can do for you than making a genuine connection. It’s not as though friends weren’t used as resources and helpers before, but there were quality, deep connections underneath the bartering of favors. These are fading.

Trust in others is diminishing. People are skeptical and judgmental in varying degrees that make an honest, mutual relationship difficult. People are less and less likely to know their neighbors, or much less intermingle with them regularly. The local news hypes violence to sell ratings-based advertisements and thus create a slight paranoia that can easily grow.

What’s left is shallow conversation of little value. People seek the help of medications to ease the pressure because they don’t have the friends around them relating to their situation. They are left isolated while collecting friends on social networks like video games or action figures.

There is no sense of reality associated with these social networks. Even without discussing the ambiguity and outright untruth that saturates the medium, there is still a prominent lack of authenticity. People add to their list of friends indiscriminately. They see their number of friends as an indicator of status or itemized popularity.

These lists mean nothing. They are trivial. They are an inefficient archive of friends and acquaintances lost. There are people who actively add to this list in hopes of some abstract concept of networking or give the illusion of popularity.

I use these people to my advantage by contacting tertiary friends through their add-a-friend lust. I have no need to add a friend to mine when I can contact them within two clicks or even a quick search. My list of friends is larger than I can handle and it is much smaller than most I’ve seen. For the most part, I keep in contact with those on the list, but there are many people I don’t contact on a regular basis. And sometimes I only sporadically read updates about in order to keep up with small changes in their day-to-day routine.

Many people contact high school friends and add them out of obligation. This is ridiculous to me. In many cases, the only thing in common with the majority of my high school mates was that they and I were in the same building for roughly eight hours each day. Some have stayed in town, others are dotted about the country, but after those four years were complete, the option to associate with people with similar interests instead of similar class schedules was paramount.

I am close or routinely in contact with those I’ve chosen to stay in touch with. The rest were acutely influential in passing and I have left it at that. Reunions are meant to catch up with those you have—intentionally or not—lost step with. The addition of these acquaintances to my social networking friend lists would be trying to hold onto a fabricated connection that was thin in the first place.

Short cell phone conversations, quick informational messages, and witty bulletins or wall posts do not make a friendship. A friendship is built on trust and mutual respect between two people with similar aspirations and interests. Life is filled with transitions that strengthen, bend, or break these friendships. This is how it’s meant to be and how it’s been since we stood upright and started losing body hair. But without some form of actual connection, a cloud of isolation forms that is heavy and sometimes debilitating.

A two-hour conversation over dinner or a small gathering among closest associates can go a long way to realizing you’re not alone. There are others with identical or similar problems. There are people there to comfort you and congratulate you depending the situation. In just that short amount of time you will likely be reminded that you are, as they say, among friends.

distaste

I don’t have a lot going for me right now. I’m seven months into moving furniture, I have about two hundred dollars in my checking and sixty in cash the wallet. I drink more frequently than I have since before the St. Patrick’s Day, but more responsibly. And I still can’t fight the disgust I feel when people binge around me. I wonder if that will ever fade. And tonight is just another example.

It’s a nice night overall. The temperature’s running about sixty-five and I’m comfortable in just a long-sleeve, polo combination with jeans. Down here you can even see the stars in some places. The city drowns them in manufactured luminescence. We’ve driven to the main stretch of bars, which as far as I can tell consists of three of them, and have walked around the corner to an Irish-named—with a sports bar and dance club theme—local haunt. There’s no one here yet.

She’s upset, visibly, but won’t explain why. After two beers in rapid succession she divulges that her mother has been diagnosed with cancer. Again. This explains the distant look and lack of focus for most of the night, but she doesn’t want to talk about it. I wouldn’t want to either. I tell her we can go whenever she likes to watch a movie, watch television, or just sit around. Her reaction makes my stomach turn: “Naw, I want to stay. Might as well get wasted, right? I just want to get drunk.”

Right.

I know things will turn ugly. I know the night would spark the same disgust that usually drapes over me on nights like this. At first I’m as involved as anyone. I play the game of the drink-to-drink crowd. It’s easy enough; I spent three years of college keeping—or setting—the expected pace in drink. But then things turn. I start to fall back and involve myself in conversation less and less. Soon it’s almost as though I came on my own accord and just happened to sit with a crowd of strangers.

That’s when the frustration sets in. why can’t I be like that again? They seem to be having more fun as I grow uneasy. Why is it so easy for them? I can get drunk, and after the first seven months of sobriety I’ve been drunk at least three times, but it happens so rarely. It happens either with much preparation, like a party I’ve known of for months, got a ride to, and whose attendees I know on at least a passing basis, or by blind-siding me like a party bus with a friend buying rum and cokes. They drink freely and I can’t.

I know all this and yet I don’t say I want to leave. I feel bad for her. She’s in a tough spot, and though I have lost respect for her because of her reaction to her mother’s sickness, I can understand where it comes from. Everyone needs an escape. Just because I can’t do it anymore doesn’t mean I don’t want to help her out if I can.

A wedding party comes in. this doesn’t seem like the sort of bar that is frequented by anyone in formal wear. They drink and are soon loud and obnoxious. I feel the frustration setting in, but her and I move to the other room and meet a couple friends. We start playing cards. I go out early on a horrible play on mediocre cards, but don’t mind. The two friends have pounded a few in the short time they’ve been here and I’m growing tired of them.

She drinks steadily at a pace that rivals the most experienced of alcoholics. Her eyes start to droop and dart back and forth. She has the focus of a three-year-old. The card game quickly falters and she begins to cry without real provocation. She walks out quickly and, after throwing an “I don’t know” back at the drunken inquiries from the two friends, I follow her.

She’s broken down on the curb. She’s sobbing lightly but seems composed. She can’t articulate, but when I ask if she’d like to go she gives a slushy nod and attempts to stand up too quickly. I catch her arm and help her to her feet and tell her to lean on the wall behind her for a second. I go in and grab her purse and the poker chips just before the table is cleared off for the DJ. The wedding party has been reduced to five people and the two friends are the only others left in the bar.

I lead her to her car and help her in. then I start off toward her place from memory. She directs sporadically, but I manage to make it back in decent time. She stumbles out and toward the house. After I open the door she rushes to the upstairs bathroom to expunge some unfortunate choices. I lie on her bed and turn on the television to find a distraction.

This is how things end. My interest is almost completely faded. I’ve only known her for a few weeks. It was a good time and she’s fun, but I’ll always have this night in the back of my mind. Drinking to forget is tiresome and moronic. The respect I’ve lost for her now may return if I put in the effort, but I won’t. I know it’s over.

She comes back in and while she changes I use the bathroom. By the time I’m back she’s changed and chewing on some cold pizza on the chair in the corner. I decline the offer to share. She puts in a movie; I forget which, and then she crawls to bed. I sleep in my jeans and ignore the attempts at arousal. If I pretend to be asleep she’s too drunk to prove me a liar. Soon she’s lightly snoring and I’m staring at the screen.