FIREWORK SPECTACLE

The other night I was at the Grand Floridian Hotel (Resort, whatever) in Disneyworld (land, whatever) as Scott's best friend from Maine was in town, and after an aggressive conversation Scott and I agreed to make the trek back up to Orlando to see her and her family again on a Tuesday night, no less (sorry to my job if I appeared less then my best the next day.)

As we arrived we realized that we came just in time to see the nightly firework spectacle that occurs in front of Cinderella's castle. Of course it is a ways a way from the resort, but you can see it brilliantly in the night sky. There were ten kids of different ages standing right by the water of the resort watching these amazing fireworks from the distance. Here's the thing about those ten kids - five of them were under the age of ten, and the other five were over the age of twenty-five.

I don't think this sudden diminishing age gap was the "magic of Disney" or because we were at the "happiest place on earth." I believe the true magic was simply just the fireworks.

There is power in the simplistic magic of fireworks that makes the loudest kids stand in awe and helps adults forget that they are not children. Is it the noise? Is it the colors? Is it the grandeur? Who cares?

For that brief moment there were no distractions for anyone. There were no business prospects. No Wii Nintendo. No chores. No bad feelings. There was just ten kids (and five of them would never be classified as kids away from fireworks) staring with inspiring awe at the exploding colors.

We, as a society, tend to separate ourselves physically every day from the world. With every invention created to bring the world closer together we all get further apart. Every second we spend on the computer is a second we don't spend with our friends or our family. Every time we plop ourselves down to watch television we allow that generational gap to grow ever wider.

We are always trying to be new and fresh, and yet no matter what the old is always what astounds us. Everyone out there with an ipod ever foamed at the mouth when someone else has an ipod? Anyone with a computer ever had time stop when you saw your friends computer? Anyone with a television ever actually faint when you see someone else's television? And even if you walked in the room and you were in awe at the television, did everyone else in the room just stop too, or was it just one person? Chances are good that it was just you.

Fireworks, sunsets, hot air balloons, alligators in the wild, etc....these are the things that makes everyone stop and watch. These are the things that remind us that our age is not what is keeping us apart from one another. We are the biggest part at keeping us apart. A five year-old and an adult are both mouth watering when they look up and see a hot air balloon or a person parachuting from the sky. An 80 year-old and a 20 year-old can stop and stare at the beauty of sunsets. A five year-old and a fifteen year-old are all together astounded at the alligator that lies on the bank of the river. And there is not a single age in the world that doesn't see fireworks in the sky and stop and take in the beauty they bring to enhance the night sky.

So maybe instead of completely engrossing ourselves in these "wonders of technology" to bring the world closer together (and I won't totally put down technology as it does absolutely serve its purpose...I love my ipod more than anything) maybe we should see if we can "stop time" and just see how far back we can go to see what brought everyone in the world closer together. What in the world makes the old and the young all meet in the middle?

And to me that night in Orlando, it wasn't a mouse or a roller coaster or an amazing arcade room...it was the night being lit up with the firework spectacle.

THE TURTLE AND THE TOTEM POLE

So today I was pulling up to my apartment complex when I saw something I had to shake my head to realize that what I was seeing wasn't just a vision. I saw the maintenance man at the apartment complex kicking a turtle that was in a parking space that nobody was in (and nobody wanted it either.) This was not a man who was nudging a turtle to get on the grass either. This man was kicking the turtle. I parked my car and by the time I got out of it (my voice ready to yell at this human being) he had got in his golf cart and gone. I also though, man if I did say anything he may have just retaliated by killing the turtle. I then proceeded to pick up the turtle and put it by the lake in the middle of the complex (where it most likely came from). His shell had been completely scratched up and I don't know if it could walk. I am hoping when I walk by this afternoon that it will be gone swimming in the water.

I was so angry. It's not like this man was protecting his life....FROM A TURTLE!!!! This was not an animal that attacks people. It doesn't hurt people. If the maintenance man was a fish or a bug then maybe he would have a case. I was so disgusted, I saw nothing but the color red. I had to put myself in that turtle's shoes (and yes, I know that sounds odd), but remember a turtle isn't a leaf or a tree, this animal can feel pain. It feels a cut. And this is not a bird or a dog, when it is being attacked or hurt can fight back easily. This is not an animal that has a distinct sound that it can let out to get help from anyone hearing. This is a simple turtle.

I called the apartment complex and gave the description of the man. I even told them that it was a maintenance man and that he was in a golf cart (how many can they have 2?) I am not up for getting anyone fired, but I'll be damned if I am going to sit by and allow someone to attack a helpless animal in such a manner. They were outraged, and couldn't believe this happened, and she seemed so furious I am sure they are going to take care of it.

However, this brought something up in my head. I am not going to go into all the things that I think that are wrong in this world. (You wouldn't stay reading this for that long.) However, I think I know why nothing is happening for the better in this country. We, as the people who think they are at the bottom of the totem pole, aren't angry enough. We are angry enough to complain. We are angry enough to feel the emotion. But when it comes to speaking up and joining together and using our voice, we just aren't quite that angry.

This may be an odd analogy but speaking up for that turtle is like speaking up for anyone who is being unjustly beaten. (And we all know people like that weather it is physical or figuratively by society or governments or whatever.) How many times do we use the voice we have. It is so funny, cause a president and Congress and everyone who is in the power of a position can have use all that power that that position will allot them. However, one person comes by and says something vicious about them (whether true or not) then how much power do they have then? Sometimes those words go away, but a lot of the time those words linger.

We are not useless people who go to work every single day and come home every single night, and watch our shows before going to bed. We have the most powerful thing in the world, WE HAVE A VOICE!!!! And that voice only gets used if we allow that anger to shout it forth. No one uses their voice effectively when they are happy or sad. That voice is used to its fullest power when we are angry. Anger is a powerful emotion.

However, the only thing that combats anger is fear. Fear fights anger really well, why do you think that a lot of people go through that part of life where they want to go for more, but they don't? Their fear is outweighing their anger (or drive, which is a form of mild anger) to achieve what they are desiring.

So here is what I think. If you are someone out there who has a brain and feels that there are things that are going wrong in this world. And since I know everyone on this entire planet knows or feels when something isn't right, then the time has come to stop waiting for other people to solve the problem for us and get out there and join our voices together to go out there and stop what is being done to human beings here and all over the world.

Listen, are we at the bottom of the totem pole in this society? ABSOLUTELY!!!! No doubt about that, but I would rather be at the bottom than at the top. For if you are at the top and you aren't keeping the people from getting angry, than that bottom part of the pole will rebel against you and walk out from underneath you. Let's face it when that happens than the rest of the pole will collapse to the floor. Now if the top disappears than what happens to the rest of the pole?

Let's face it, the bottom of the totem pole has way more power than the top? So why not use it to our advantage?

THE COUNTRY IS KILLING US WITH SLOW JAZZ

So this morning I spent a good majority of my time on the telephone. At first I called UPS who sent me to the Best Buy who sent me to their Best Buy main office. The why to all of this is completely unimportant. In my wild goose chase for my missing computer part I found that two things were the same no matter where I called: 1) I inevitably was going to be getting a fake computer woman (though i don't want to put her down, she was very nice; though not responsive), 2) The companies are getting smart, and if you want to speak to a real person you can no longer just push 0, and 3) During the waiting time they play nothing but slow jazz. Then they wonder why I am so mad when they finally get to me.

I think this country's big businesses are trying to kill us all with slow jazz. They make us wait forever on the phone for every small reason (and I'm still not convinced the employees aren't playing on facebook while they are "going to get a manager"). They make us wait while the nice computer woman (nice cause she never yells back at me when i yell at her) goes through the list of numbers that we have to push (none of which ever seem to match what I am looking for.) They make us wait while they send us to the right department, as we were sent to the wrong department in the first place. Waiting....waiting....waiting...

I'm sick and tired of waiting!!!

So I begin to wonder, how much of our life is spent waiting? Don't expect any wonderful calculations, I didn't do any. But I don't think I have to. I think if you are reading this you know how much of our time is spent waiting for things on the phone. And please raise your hand if you think that this waiting process that they put us through makes us just more angry. I know it's a blog, I can't see you, but something is telling me that I don't need to. You can put your hand down now.

So much time is spent waiting on these frivolous nothing things. (And most of the time we end up hanging up anyway.) And I think life and time is passing us by, when we have so many other things to accomplish. But here lies the Catch-22, we are becoming such an immediate society that we refuse to wait. We are willing to wait (though getting angry) on the phone to complain about the part we didn't get from Best Buy, but when it comes to life lessons or life goals we have lost the power to wait.

I was told the other day that I "want everything so immediately." And I was taken aback (as I usually tend to be when someone wants to take on me, which I love). I realized that that person was right. I have all of these goals and I don't want to wait anymore, so I do what i do with the phone, I hang up. I think most of us are like that, and I definitely think the youth of this country are turning into that. It hurts me.

The world around us is becoming so immediate, yet when it comes to fixing the problems (even something as simple as a part you ordered for your computer) the world is still far behind. When it comes to complaining about something or finding out something that happened to us we want to speak to a real human being (and trust me the UPS guy got some words he shouldn't have had to endure.....including my brilliant line "YOU ARE RIGHT, YOU ARE NOT FED EX AND THAT DOES SUCK.")

It is time to focus on ourselves in a humble way. We have got to realize that WAITING IS IMPORTANT, but it isn't worth waiting for when there is "slow jazz" playing. Waiting is only important when we are going for the gold; when we are trying to achieve our goals the old fashioned way, through hard work and pain. Besides when we do that kind of waiting, it tends to be more swing music then old jazz.

So let's all make a pact (even though we are 14 people reading this blog strong) and when we are waiting and slow jazz is playing, let's hang up. However, when there is pain and excitement and fear and swing music we hear, that means it is all going to be worth the wait.