For Every Action There is an Equal and Opposite Reaction

I read about Matthew Shepherd today. He was only twenty one when his life was maliciously and deliberately stolen from him. And why? Because he was gay. I remember being twenty-one. It was a difficult time. In fact, life isn't any less difficult now. I was just starting as a flight attendant. Back then I had no idea that it would end up being a career for me, a career which right now seems uncertain, with the airline's not doing so well and the threat of a possible layoff in the distance. Life is so full of uncertainty, and as was proven by Matthew, even the continuation of life is not certain.
This fact is poignantly illustrated by our obsession with the end of the world. The end of the Mayan calendar, killer asteroids, plagues, nucleaur holocoust, every day we are reminded just how fragile our puny existince is.
Matthew Shepherd's life ended suddenly, and he hadn't even really begun to live it. It seems a little bit selfish to contemplate the end of the world, when the world ends every day for many people before they even have the chance to live it.
Just the other day a guy I knew in high school died peacefully in his sleep at the age of twenty-six because of the flu. An autopsy is being performed to determine the direct cause of death. It was thought that he was healthy. He had no known underlying condition. He went to sleep assuming that he would rise the next morning like he always had before.
And so this is how life goes. We must weigh our hopes and our dreams against the cold and sudden certainty of death. Whether that death will come peacefully in our sleep, violently at the hand of those who hate us, or with everyone else in an apocalyptic disaster, none of us can know.
For so many their world ends, and I feel like I'm wasting away slowly behind a curtain of indifference. I feel like every day I'm just doing what I normally do, what I've always done, instead of what I should be doing.
Sometimes we act this way because we know death is certain, and it's easy to feel like nothing's worth the fight. As the saying goes, "Life's a bitch and then you die." It seems like so many of my peers give in to this sentiment without even knowing it. How many of us are already dying-- failing to achive our full potential? We do drugs and we sit at home and gorge ourselves on all kinds of food.
Death is depressing. The thought of death. I think that a lot of us can't deal with it, and that's why we just sit on our asses and don't do anything. We do things only when they present themselves to us. We live our lives in reaction, instead of action, because with death looming at an uncertain distance reaction seems safer than action.
Taking action takes courage. It takes self confidence. For me, I've sat on my butt the last few months without the courage to do what I've alwas wanted to do... write. I've made the excuse that I don't know what to write about, but the truth is not so much that I don't know what to write, but that I fear that no one will care to read it, or that what I want to write will be too honest and make me too vulnerable.
And so i'm making a committement to myself and all of my friends on facebook that I'm going to start writing. I'm not going to make excuses anymore because at some point I won't be around to make excuses. I hope you will all check back at my notes. I will also post what I write on a blog that you can all subscribe to.
I have to say that what some of you may not like what I write. Some of you may not agree with it, but that's part of the deal. I need to be honest with myself. If an actor is a liar, a writer is the exact opposite. A good writer must be honest with himself and his feelings and have the courage to convey those feelings to his audience.
I'm not going to wait for life to present me with something to react to... this is me taking action.

About the Title

Look Mom and Dad... and Alanna... I don't really care that you think the title is crude. This is all a part of me being honest in my writing. Besides... how am I going to have a popular blog if no one can remember the title?