Finding the Unison of eHarmony

Did you know when Adele sings "Never mind, I'll find someone like you" there is never any harmony?  It's true.  In today's hit modern music it is nonpareil for a song to be barren of harmonizing backup.  But, perhaps Adele is on to something.  Perhaps Adele doesn't need backup.  She doesn't need harmony.  She needs the note; the one note; her note.  Perhaps this is a one-person song.  A self-song.  Someone like YOU.   

When I mull over what I'm looking for in a spouse, basically it comes down to one thing: I want someone like me.  How conceited does that sound?!  I know, I know...  But, at least I didn't say someone like my mother!  (How ungrateful does THAT sound?!)

Here's the deal...  It's not about love.  I love several people with whom I could never have a successful relationship.  It's about what I seek in a partner.  Partnership is collaboration.  It means both people bring something to the relationship.  I don't expect to be given anything more than I'm willing to offer.  But, I do expect to be matched.  

Growing up I was taught a successful marriage is any marriage that incorporates shared values and goals.  Basically, any two people who share the same goals and values can wed and build a successful marriage despite whether a romantic relationship exists or not.  

Sociologically speaking, this is probably accurate: build a successful marriage--yes; but, a happy successful marriage--meh...take your chances.  Personal revelations have lead me not to discount or take for granted the powers of temperament and bond.  Opposites poles may attract, but like molecules bond.*

It's not that certain differences can't apply.  I certainly don't want a clone.  We don't need to see eye-to-eye on everything.  I've dated people whose favorite color is different than mine, who like different music than me, have different political and religious views than me.  But...remember that old saying it takes one to know one?  I feel like I...me...who I am...what I can offer...my essence won't be fully appreciated and/or loved sufficiently unless it's by someone with similar aesthetic.

Neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.**

Swine rhymes with wine.  Here's a story about wine! (transition A+)

I used to work as a server in a restaurant.  Two married couples who shared a connoisseurship for wine would meet at the restaurant to share their yearly finds.  They had nine bottles of wine between the two of them!  Obviously more than enough to share!  So, they did.  

They offered me a glass of at least five of the nine wines, often accompanied with gregarious marketing.  "You NEED to come take a sip of this wine.  This wine is guaranteed to change your life!!"  "This one is perfectly sweet and light and fresh...one swallow and you will never let another plum wine sit before you again!!"  "Here.  Just take this glass in the back with you...when you get a break, you can try it.  But, beware!  It may take you several minutes to recuperate.  It is THAT GOOD."

I let them continue to think I was refusing their wine because I was on the clock.  They were so generous to offer it to me.  Their gusto was palpable and their zeal was winsome.  But, the truth is, I don't drink wine.

I have no doubt on the trained tongue the wine was everything they claimed.  But, to me, it was repellent.  It held no allure.  As they described and advertised the wines, I often didn't know what they were talking about.  Nor did I care.  Never having purchased or tasted wine before made me completely unqualified to appreciate their connoisseurship.  

There I was, the apathetic swine, nonchalantly trampling the pearls they cast before me.  Fortunately, I was just their server for a couple of hours and not someone to be saddled with the next 50 years.  Marriage, like any other project, is a project to be completed successfully, and thus requires a synergized crew.  

If you were putting together an opera, who would you assemble?  Singers, composers, a director...  Different facets, but all with an eye and appreciation for opera.  Likewise, it takes more than just players to make a football game.  Referees, coaches, (debatably) even cheerleaders.  When building a house, would you hire a construction crew or a biker gang?  

Comrades on a construction site are not likely to feel safe if half their crew is replaced by nail-gun wielding cheerleaders.  Nor would a coloratura soprano fair well in the Monday-night lineups.  And, a football referee would probably blow the whistle on singing through a 3 hour opera.  

In order for these projects to succeed they require people with a common passion, ability, or expertise.  

So, what kind of project am I?  Unfortunately, my friends, I am the worst kind of project: an enigma.  What does that even mean??  I don't even know what an enigma is!!  Precisely.  No one does.  

Were I an opera, I would need an enthusiast.  Were I a football game, I'd need a fan.  Were I a construction site, I'd need an expert.  But, some things are indescribable.  For some things there are no words.

I certainly have a rare if not unique way of viewing and handling the world.  This commonality is what I need to find in someone else.  Not necessarily someone with the same view, but someone with the same je na sais quoi.***  Someone who at least appreciates and loves my view.  Someone who is inspired by the way I think and speak and inspires my thinking and speaking.  Someone with the same synergy.  Someone with whom I can be as comfortable as I am with myself.  Someone like me.

I tried to put all this on my profile, but for some reason eHarmony told me the "What I'm Looking For" section had exceeded the allotted number of characters.****  

Footnotes

*This sounds like something that could be usurped as a catchphrase for the Gay Marriage Movement.  I assure you, I did not intend it that way. 

**This is a perfect example of what I'm talking about in this article.  Most people probably think I'm quoting the bible.  Only someone with my same aesthetic will know I'm actually making an analogy between myself and the lead character from the classic MGM musical, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers.

***This is another perfect example.  Who uses words like that?!?  Only someone like me.  #idiosyncracticsentences #enigma

****I don't really have an eHarmony profile.  I probably should.

Epilogue

Oprah once made the comment there are no Christmas decorations with black angels and immediately her mailbox was filled with photos, cards, and black angel craft projects.  If I were a celebrity, I'm sure I would receive thousands of letters detailing examples of working marriages despite the participants being polar opposites.

I know there are examples out there.  However, I would also argue these couples are probably more similar in the areas that count than they outwardly seem.  

What counts and what does not differs from couple to couple.  Partners in crime versus sweethearts, for instance.  We also don't often wear what counts on our sleeve.  Rather than dissecting the ways a couple is different, note the ways in which they are the same.  My hypothesis is the similar areas will be nearer the heart and hold more weight than the differences.  Personas and attitudes are not the same as goals and values. 

My Job: A Summary Through Similes

My job not only demands biting your tongue idiomatically, it's like biting your tongue literally.  

You chew flawlessly every day.  The jaw goes down, the jaw comes up, your teeth meet, rinse & repeat.  You perform this task hundreds, thousands, even millions of times without incident or acknowledgment.  But, the one little time you slip up your body will not let it go unnoticed.

"Nice job, dummy.  You screwed up."

Never mind all the days and all the times you did everything correct.  Never mind your 99.9% average chewing success rate.  No appreciation there.  No, the only thing that matters is when performing this one particular bite, this one particular time, on this one particular day, you failed.

And, it's very important to make you wince and feel the throbbing so you won't repeat that .1% behavior again.  Because that .1% is overshadowing the 99.9% and killing business.

My job is like meals at a restaurant.

I have a friend who use to say it's always more fun to experience the magic than it is to create it.  It's true, isn't it?

For my mom's birthday every year we would go out to dinner.  And, every year my mom would push away from the table and contend, "That was delicious.  And the best part is, I didn't have to make it or clean it up."

All we see is pretty food on a plate.  All we taste is yummy on our tongue.  We don't see the years of education, and the hours of labor--the chopping, slicing, marinating, deboning, mixing--the slaving over a hot stove all day, and the sinks of suds and grime.  All we see is the appetizing part; the pretty picture; the flower when it's in bloom.

Every year thousands of tourists patron Holland to see the tulip festival.  Visitors marvel at the magnitude, the beauty, and the design, but months before almost no one is around to bend their back and get their knees dirty digging holes and planting bulb after bulb.

Sometimes people say to me, "You must have the best job in the world."  Not exactly.  On its most gracious days it's a half hour tulip festival followed by two hours of grimy suds.

My job is like eating chocolate cake.  

Miss Trunchbull, the unctuous, domineering, abhorrent antagonist of the book Matilda calls for an immediate assembly of the entire student body.  There, she brings a porky boy named Bruce Bogtrotter to the stage.  Bruce has been caught stealing a piece of chocolate cake.  The entire student body is on edge to see what vile thing she is going to do to Bruce.

She gives him chocolate cake.

The student body is stunned.  Even Bruce is confounded.  Giving him the thing he enjoys most seems more like a reward than a punishment.  Bruce happily indulges in the chocolate scrumptiousness, enjoying every bit of cake on the plate.  But, Miss Trunchbull doesn't stop there.

"You look like you enjoyed that, Brucey."

"Yes, Ma'am," he mutters with his mouth full.

Miss Trunchbull leans in closer.  "You must have some more."

She brings out a ginormous cake as big as Bruce himself.

Bruce shakes his head.  "No, thanks," he tries.

"But, you'll hurt Cook's feelings.  She made this cake just for you to have on your very own.  Her sweat and blood went into this cake and you will not leave this platform until you have consumed the entire confection!!"

"You wanted cake," she grumbles, "you got cake!  Now, EAT IT!!"

With each increasing bite Bruce's demeanor worsens.  His face is pale and woozy.  He looks like chocolate puke will explode any minute.  It's delicious taste has obviously become poisonous, yet Bruce is forced to shove forkful after forkful down his throat.

Even chocolate cake which is delectable and yummy in the beginning can turn venomous.

My job is like living in the land of Oz.

For a company with an open-door policy, there are a lot of people--wizards who hold our job and our fate with the company in their hands--who we never see, are never allowed to see, and who stay behind curtains.

We are not to pay any attention to what goes on behind curtains.

And there are many, many curious things that happen behind the curtains.

I suppose it's also like living in The Capitol.  There seems to be a lot of power and a lot of facade.  And, no one really knows the truth...

But, the one thing we do know is you don't whistle while The Capitol is watching.  And The Capitol is always watching.

My job is like a televangelist.  

People are willing to pay fortunes to those who can give them hope and the stability to dream.  Such is the product we're paid to peddle.  It brings out a lot of good and provides a lot of happy moments for a lot of people.  But, a quick look at the tax returns, expense reports, and company receipts provides its own enlightenment.

It's very informative to see where all this blessed money actually goes and where it doesn't.

What similes describe your job?

Comment and let me know :-)

Chicken of the Sea Cup

Isn't it interesting how chicken breasts and fish fillets look so similar to each other?  I mean, you could not have two more opposite animals than foul and fish.  But, fry them up and put them on a plate and it's difficult to tell the two apart.  They both have that oblong, tear-drop shape.  Yet, for a chicken it's only the shape of their breast while the shape constitutes the entire profile for a fish.

Do you know what that means??  That means chickens probably compare breasts by relating them to fish.  Fish are the melons of the bird world!!  The watermelons, the cantaloupes, the grapefruits, the oranges!  Chickens use fish euphemistically!

 

Rooster: Yo, Belinda!  Yous got some nice, juicy snappers, chickadee!

Belinda: Take a cold shower, birdbrain. 

An Eye of the Storm's Outlook on the Eye of the Tiger

I’m often asked my feelings toward God or religion--especially when people learn of my background.

The other day I watched media coverage of tornado wreckage in Oklahoma.  In the middle of an interview, a survivor amazingly finds her missing dog among the debris.  She is overcome with heavenly thanks and gratitude. 

“Well, I thought God only answered one prayer,” she tearfully whispers, “To let me be okay.  But, he answered both of them.  Because this was my second prayer.”

I put myself in her position: a catastrophe; out of control; everything you’ve known to be solid and steady your whole life pulverized in an instant; no match; forceless; powerless to do anything but let nature have it’s way with you...  And, I realized something. 

In such a situation, my immediate thought would be “So, this is it, huh.  This is how it happens.”  Solemn resignation.  No pleading.  No praying.  Just acceptance.

Calm amidst the fury; the eye of the storm.

And, that’s it.  That speaks for me.  It is probably the most accurate portrayal of me and religion I’ve ever come across.  

It’s not that I believe or disbelieve (neither is the case).  I just simply am.  I allow things to be.  I don’t need to know.  I am sufficient without hope.  Acceptance provides all the peace and comfort I need.  I wouldn’t turn higher powers down, but I don’t feel the urge to search them out the way others do.  Not even in times of ultimate turmoil when it often becomes convenient to do so.  I am content to accept any possibility.

It is paradoxical: 

Others commit themselves to religion the same as they commit to an underground shelter, escaping the storm in a place of refuge, security, and peace.  Contrarily, my resignation to any possibility leaves me untethered, giving the appearance of a scattered, shilly-shallying fool.  Those cemented in their basements see me solitarily roaming the vacant fields and no doubt view the decision as idiotic, irresponsible, and featherbrained. 

By all accounts an armorless, unprotected lad should be whisked away.  Yet, the opposite is true.

Rather than refuging in a box, the willingness to accept any possibility actually creates a center of security and comfort inside of me.  Essentially, I become my own shelter.  Therefore, it matters not where I go.  In my permeable state, I feel more grounded porously letting the wind whip through me in the middle of a field than the many people I observe scurrying to a bunker.

It’s interesting because--in our day-to-day lives--believing in everything and nothing at the same time would be considered spreading yourself too thin.  It’s not progressive and not recommended.  Retirement funds, spouses, children, heart-healthy living...anything that accumulates over time or has a critical period belong to people who make a decision and adhere to it unwaveringly.  However, the roles reverse when it comes to protection and defense.

The man equipped with a castle, shield, crossbow, spear, catapult, boiling tar, and even large pebbles is better befitted for battle than a man who carries one small knife in his pocket.  Rather than being spread thin, his accumulation amounts to a fortress.  The first man is prepared for anything, the latter must hope he encounters a very specific foe.

The same is true for the modern-day weapons: words, ideas, and intent.  Openness to accept any possibility is an automatic absorber, which means there is never any need to deflect or counterattack.  Standing poised to hear any idea or opinion, and willing to accept the amount of truth in it--no matter how small--nips offense (which leads to retaliating defense) before it starts.  

The most common response to hurtful words is to defend oneself by firing back with stronger, more potently hurtful words.  However, where no offense exists, there is nothing to battle.  The best defense is not to fire back and hope your weapons are stronger, but to quell creation of a battle in the first place.

Imagine a man fighting a river.  He may slice the river to and fro, but he will not get very far in his conquest.  The man is battling where no battle exists: the man may have a problem with the river, but the river has no problem with the man.  The river acknowledges his presence but is too busy flowing past the man to fight.  The river won the battle before it even started.

There is no sense in fighting truth.  And there is truth in every opinion, i.e., everyone believes their opinion is correct.  Subdue arguments from spawning by examining the authenticity of the opinion rather than fighting it.  After all, it is up to you to decide whether you agree or not.  If you agree, then you and the man are flowing in the same direction.  If not, leave him be and float on by.  Though the blow of his sword be disagreeable, it has no power to change the course of your current.  Therefore, what does his sword matter?   

Like the river, perhaps the key to getting through this life is not finding the strength to fight (enduring to the end as my people call it), but recognizing there is no need to fight.  Fundamentally, the absence of fighting seems most peaceful.

The other day a friend posted Mark 5:36 “Don’t be afraid.  Just believe.”  He posts quotes like this often.  They are his boxing coach with a corner stool, waiting to give him a douse of water, a quick shoulder rub, and tell him to get back out there.  Their effect rarely lasts longer than a day and often only lasts a few minutes.

He is not alone.  Almost everyone I’ve encountered clings to Jesus as a bodyguard.  Someone to step in and deal with life's challenges.  When it all becomes too much it’s easier to shut off and let Jesus take the wheel.  The intriguing matter is, when Jesus is behind the wheel, it's not uncommon to be steered into thorny patches.

From my personal experience, as well as my observations of countless others, the Christian institution of hope humanity runs to for peace, love, and surety also correlates to depression, judgment, and crippling levels of self-loathing and flagellation.   I have never seen people beat themselves up or be more cruel to anyone than they are to themselves when they feel they are not appropriately measuring up to Christian levels of perfection.  And, perfection is an ever-present reminder.

Take the scripture for example: "Don't be afraid.  Just believe." carries the implication the fear exists because of a lack in faith, i.e., something you're doing wrong.  If you had enough faith, fear wouldn't be an issue.  Even in trying to convey strength and hope, it backhands with a cuffing reminder of imperfections.  The cuff instills further insufficiency in need of further back-patting, hence the child clings even tighter to Mommy's pant leg.  Like a shared syringe that first contaminates then vaccinates, gospel teachings first create insecurity, then offer sanctuary.  It is passive-aggressive parenting at its finest.

It is this variable-ratio schedule of rewarding that makes religion so addicting.  There is no doubt about it: religion is a drug.  Most people swallow it like a vitamin, seeing it as medicine to keep them strong or make them feel better.  From my observations, I think it’s used more as a narcotic, inducing inexplicable euphoric moods that crash down into unbearable lows when the high wears off.  Hence, the admonition for daily, minutely, even momentary upkeep: always a prayer in the heart and a scripture on the tongue; take a hit.  

I have sat for hours with so many people in the lows.  People frightened and searching for the strength to govern themselves.  It hurts my heart to see people tormented with pain I believe unnecessary.

People trust their feelings firmer than anything else.  But, feelings are easily created and even easier manipulated.  I have witnessed this first-hand.  And nothing does it more swiftly than religion.

It is easier to govern the world than it is to govern oneself.  It is also easier to let oneself be governed than it is to govern oneself.  Yet, there is nothing more beneficial.        

I do not vehemently oppose religion by any means.  Though I find the way people look to the source of their anguish to be the same source of their remedy most intriguing, I support religion and all those who choose to abide by it (I also support all those who do not wish to abide by it).  I have seen it provide many great things for many people.

People believe the world would be a better place if everyone believed in Christ.  I believe in kindness, love, acceptance, empathy, understanding, and that the world would be a better place if people refrained syphoning so much of their power into an external source and instead learned to provide that power internally.  

Self-actualization is my religion: the achievement of one’s full potential through creativity, independence, spontaneity, and a grasp of the real world; the process of establishing oneself as a whole person.

When it comes to an afterlife...I am open to many ideas.  But, when it comes to this life and getting me through it...  Saviors may take a seventh, eighth, ninth, and even tenth day because I was born a generator.

Burn, Baby, Burn!

Went out to burn a few calories today unaware I was the one about to be burned.

As I was running alongside the road a man rolled down his window and shouted, "YOU WILL NEVER.  LOSE.  WEIGHT!!"

HAH!  

Come again, coward!  I race for the cure anyway!  I already have the slogan for our T-shirts: Alopecia Releash-Ya!  It's a clever, rhyming play on words.  That's right; I'm clever AND running, despite living with alopecia.   

So, if you think you may dampen my spirit more than this sweat dampens my shirt…  NAY, sir!  A [health] HEART-Y nay, I say!  

In fact, just to spite him, I actually DOUBLED my heart rate by keeping pace while sobbing uncontrollably.

Moments with Mom

Mom--We put a new tree in the front yard.  Tress are expensive!

Niko--Are they?  Because they're literally free everywhere you look.

Mom was amused. 

****

Mom--(Searching through the bathroom drawer) Somehow...I lost my...

Niko--(Finishing her sentence for her) Dignity?

Mom--Lip gloss.

Mom was not amused.

****

Mom came back from an errand where she was "just going to run in here real quick" to find two disgruntled, sweaty children in the backseat, refusing eye contact, and pressing send on their phones.

Niko--We're sending you a couple articles on leaving your children alone in the car with the windows rolled up.

****

Mom made my sister's favorite meal minus the one ingredient she can't stand.

Mom--I brought dill just in case. Since you were the one who requested these burgers I didn't put any dill in because I didn't want to ruin them for you.

Niko--She's hoping you'll choose to ruin them for yourself.

Mom--They're SO MUCH better with dill. They really need it.

She sets the bottle of dill in the middle of the counter like a gauntlet and turns her back.

Sister--What can I say? I'm a mess of complaints.

Niko--I'm going to use that in your eulogy: "She often described herself as a mess of complaints. We'll miss that about her. Not her complaining; her willingness to point out her own flaws so the rest of us didn't have to."

Roots in the Restroom: The Lineage of Stall Walls

As much as I don't connect with the banally juvenile need to inscribe etchings and declarations on the walls of bathroom stalls...

I read them. 

And occasionally take pictures.

It's a guilty pleasure.  Like reading the tabloid headlines while waiting in the supermarket checkout line. 

Scratchings on a bathroom stall, graffiti on a rock…it seems so adolescent and classless.  Initials carved in a tree are sweet, but not much better.  It's apparent the need to mark things is ubiquitous the world over.  No matter where you go, someone with a marker or can of spray paint  "was here."  

When I was in junior high I played percussion in the school band.  Toward the end of my junior high career we received new heads for the timpani drums (the vibrating skin that stretches across the top).  Using our drumsticks, we discovered we could leave an imprint on the fresh surface, much like utensils or fingernails on leftovers in a styrofoam box (anyone who has ever had roommates knows what I'm talking about).  To leave our legacy, the graduating class all carved our initials into the new timpani heads. 

Our band teacher was not happy when he found out.  He fined us all for the graffiti.  We were in our final semester of junior high; students were not allowed to graduate unless all fines were paid.

He fined each of us $40.  Costs for brand new timpani heads start at $40!  He wasn't charging us collectively, he was charging each one of us for the cost of a new timpani head.  The rest of the percussion ensemble cowered and paid the fine.  I was not as easily subdued. 

My band teacher was prone to frustration that escalated.  My mother, band teacher, and I sat across the desk from the principal.  We ended up in the principal's office after he and I twice discussed the matter in his office privately.  

I hadn't wanted to involve my mother.  I'd never been in trouble before!  I didn't want her to know what I'd done.  I thought I was going to get plenty of heat from her about it.  Yet, in the office she sat, and strangely enough, she was on my side.

The band teacher argued that any marking on the timpani not only altered the look, but the sound.  It didn't matter if the other band boys made at etching as well.  Had I been the only one, the timpani would still need replacing.  Therefore, he was charging each boy individually for the cost of a new timpani head.

I rebutted.  Our previous timpani heads had been 15 years old.  They were filled with marks, dings, dents, and plenty of similar inscriptions from past students.  Yet, the sound they made was so unchanged we continued to use them in every concert.  Likewise, the sound of the new timpani clearly had not been degraded as he claimed since we'd been playing the timpani in class for several weeks and it was only when he saw the initials he knew they were there.  

I owned up to responsibility and amends for my actions.  Haggling like I was at a flea market in a foreign port, I offered him $2.50 for the square inch of plastic my initials scarred.  He scoffed at my incredulity.  

It was at this point the principal piped in with words like vandalism and juvenile court.  My mom seemed unfazed, inconvenienced as if the words were a few crumbs she had to brush off her blouse.  I was stunned!  

Looking back now, I understand why: a school prosecuting a minor on the honor roll for inoffensive vandalism of property that remained fully functional, and for which the student offered to pay partial restitution...  Juvenile court would have laughed at them.  At the time, however, his hefty words bore down on my 14-year-old conscience of life and future.  They frightened me.  One place I did not want to leave my mark was on a criminal record.  I knew what I had done was technically vandalism.  They had a case.  The mention of those two words--vandalism and court--broke me.  I took the $40 plea bargain.

My mom covered the cost, if only to put the whole thing to rest.  A legal battle was of no concern to her, but $40 also wasn't worth jeopardizing my upcoming graduation. 

Why did I do it in the first place?  What is this overwhelming need humans have--this deep-seeded desire to let a complete stranger with whom we share no connection know at one point our existence lead us past this place--that it becomes universally necessary to vandalize rather than purchase a postcard?  I used to think this was odd.  Then I realized people have been peeing all over history since it began.  

America was named after Amerigo Vespucci and/or Richard Ameryk.  He found a continent and made sure everyone knew "Amerigo was here."  Ceasar Chavez earned himself a long stretch of street in California.  Reverend Henry Smith settled Smithfield, Maine.  Gustave Eiffel erected the famous tower of the same name.  Lou Gehrig put his stamp on amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.  A Yurchenko is the most popular vault performed in gymnastics (and is done while wearing a leotard named after its inventor, Jules Léotard).  Natalia Yurchenko coined the term when she became the first person to perform the vault in the early 80s.  

People, places, things, events, inventions, accomplishments, findings, creations…history is nothing if not a percolated list of people placing their marks: I discovered this; I made this; I made this famous; I am why you know this; I was the first; I was the best; I was here.

Now, I'm not saying that "John took a big one" is a declaration that will make it in the history books.  I think we expect such things to go unrecognized when we write them.  Yet, we write them anyway.  Why?

Objects in motion stay in motion; objects at rest stay at rest.  It defies the laws of inertia for an object to make the effort to write an inscription while resting on a toilet or sitting at a bar unless there is an outside force at work.  The force could be boredom, but shouldn't boredom fall under the same auspices?  A mind at rest should want to stay at rest?  

This leads me to believe the behavior stems from the same biology as reproduction and involves mastery, staking a claim, leaving a legacy.  Almost on an imperceptible, unconscious level nature is working to make sure we live on; that our legacy carries forward.  These wall inscriptions, then, become social sex.  We bees are dusting surfaces of the earth with pollinated platitudes to propagate survival of our species.

Knowing the stall walls are covered in social seed makes restroom sanitation even less savory.  But, there is some truth in that, isn't there?  Like dandelion seeds we float around this globe dropping our presence here and there, hoping someone will notice, archeologists will one day unearth the fossils of Hard Rock Cafe's walls and "Joan's an ANIMAL!!!--Vegas Bachelorette Party 2009" will make its way into history.  Even if the archeologist happens to be us returning to the same place 20 years later, we keep the glimmer of nostalgic hope it will mean something to someone someday.

As comatose as these engravings may seem, we must expect SOME response (personal or social) to come from them.  Otherwise, we would never make them--or even think to make them--in the first place!  Whether it's to shock the world with caveman scratchings of anatomy, or a moment of rebellious pleasure to prove "stick-in-the-mud" does not apply as much as everyone assumes it does, a confessional when even the nearest cathedral is still too far away, or just to let the universe know you were here; you existed, there is tremendous propulsion in the human race (even on an unconscious level) to make an impact.  To feel like your existence was not bupkis. 

I daresay it is vital and necessary to continuing life.  If our presence feels undetectable I gather we would not persist our presence very long.  What's the point?  If objects in motion stay in motion, those at rest stay at rest, then those undetectable will remain undetected. 

If the cruciality is that important to our livelihood…then who can blame these scriptors of screens, these poets of panels, these vandals who jot on joints?  Write on, Hoodlums!!

But, please be responsible and use protection.  Abstinence is best, but when one cannot abstain, greenhouse those dandelion seeds.  Prophylactic those professions to social media.  Look at me!  I'm doing it right now!  My lesson was learned.  My record's been clean since my one underage band offense.  I've become one of the foremost fornicators of word propriety there is!

Post an image on Facebook's wall rather than scratching one into China's.  Write about the end of the world on a blog instead of street corner.  Leave "For A Good Time" ads off the tile and on Craigslist.  Same impact; less clean up.

Niko wasn't just here, he IS here--2013