Blindness.

Oh, dear God.  Some people just don't know how much they have it good.  

Even me.

And how stupid I am to think that writing about people in unfortunate circumstances would evoke any sort emotion in my creative writing course, where creativity goes to die.

It's probably because when I said "unfortunate circumstances," they thought I meant horrifically tragic shit like losing your job, totaling your car, or dropping your smartphone in the toilet.  But instead they got narratives about homelessness, violence, drug addiction, teen pregnancy, prostitution, and overall insanity.  Oh, why I never!

And hence, from their no-questions-no-applause expressions, I knew that I had succeeded in biting the class in the ass with unpredictability.  Ha!  Take that, lovers of generic crap!

But since my story failed to connect to my audience, I, the writer, has failed, right?  Well, that's in the words of my creative writing professor.  However, here's the truth she won't admit to--she doesn't know what the hell I was talking about.  She didn't understand a thing of it.  It might as well as been written in Chinese; it was all foreign to her.

Okay, let's just get something clear--you ARE well aware that there are issues like homelessness and drug addiction that DO exist, correct?

How did I know that was the case?  After receiving a good dosage of life on the wild side, I have a general idea of what it's like to be in the shadowy areas as well as the well-lit ones.  And finally, after almost seven years, here's the conclusion I came up with--if you've always had a home, grown up with stability, was never abused, finished high school, and fully applied your DARE education to the T, your problems are NOTHING compared to what some others are currently going through.  NOTHING.  

And guess what?  They didn't get to choose their lives, as many might say.  They were born into darkness and emptiness and have been trying to light their own ways and fill up those holes ever since.

At the moment my college social life is virtually nonexistent.  The reason is because I'm surrounded mainly by people raised in sheltered families.  In their world, you don't use the word "homeless" unless you're making a joke.  Owning the iPhone 4 when everyone has the iPhone 5 is an unthinkable travesty.  And you don't get involved with strange people.  You just don't.

So far, I've broken every single one of those rules, and then some.  Oh, yes.  She's an outcast.

You guys post every single one of your shallow, repetitious emotions on fucking Facebook, and you're calling ME a freak?

The most common complaint I hear from college students around me is that they are stressed.  To many of them, if they don't get straight A's they will fall under the life-long curse of celibacy.  Complain, gripe, text ":(" face to friends, update the Facebook status with, "Wish it was Friday."  ...Really?  You've got a stocked fridge, over $500 in savings, are in a relationship that sounds trouble-free, AND can afford post-secondary education, and YOU'RE complaining?

My, God.  How can you be so blind?

This blindness, ladies and gentlemen, is what keeps people from seeing the dark reality, or even believing that it's true.  This blindness, it is what keeps people from realizing the things that matter, and overemphasizing the things that don't.  This blindness, it is what draws the squeaky, unerasable chalk line between the well-off and the screwed-over. This blindness, it is what keeps us divided in our understandings.  This blindness is killing us all.

It pains me to see this blindness rapidly spreading, because I can think of so many others who would give the little they had to live the same lives as the certifiably fortunate.  I myself wish that I could them the life that far too many are taking for granted.  Among those people is my own best friend--fatherless, in and out of group homes as a teen, hated by many, constantly broke, but still willing to buy a hot meal for a lady sleeping at the bus stop.  Another--unemployed, abused, 6-months pregnant, fears to come home at night because she might be in pain the next morning.

No, this is not some sort of eclectic mix of brain vomit from my sick mind!  This is fucking real!

Am I the only one here at my college who is blind to the bright side, where everyone seems to be?  Is this why I am so surrounded by people, yet so alone?

So here I am, floating in this empty, dark space--a void of my own thoughts.  

And nobody knows I'm right here in front of their fucking faces.