5:10 p.m. - 2002-11-04
So get off your ass then, you punk.
I saw Bowling for Columbine this weekend. I liked it a lot, as I expected. It was thought provoking and well done, but the thoughts it provoked were not new to me, they felt very familiar and a little worn. Passionate anger was fueled, passionate disbelief was kindled, and other types of passion was poked and prodded.

Familiar.

The difference I really noticed this time was how familiar my reaction to it has become, and it made me sad and happy all at once. It can be summed up (although not exactly accurately and way too simply) by saying that I waited for the passion to die back down so I could continue on.

I�m getting older like everybody, but the way my aging is revealing itself to me more and more lately is through this revelation that my convictions are a lot less passionate than they used to be. I have gone through the anger, the shock of what people can and will do to each other, the disbelief in the way we treat ourselves and the world, the disappointment in myself and others for taking the path that is paved in selfish desires and lack of compassion. I still feel the same way, but the argument has been made, the conclusion has been drawn, and the actions I have taken have been finally filed away as mostly lip service. In my �maturity� I have simply become more comfortable with not doing a damn thing about it.

I�m the type of person who doesn�t, or hasn�t, found contentment in doing �something� over doing �everything�. This sadly translates into doing nothing a lot of the time. I used to feel that the intensity of my feelings held merit on their own, and the fact that I saw that there were things terribly wrong made me a good guy even if all it drove me to was long tirades and seething anger. Sure I�ve done some things that have helped, I�ve volunteered, donated, and many other day to day actions that have made a difference in others lives more than in my own, but it is not proportionate to the fire I felt, it is not nearly what could have, or it seems, should have been driven by the conviction.

Now I find myself searching for that same feeling, the one that lets me know I�m alive, in smaller doses, in rebellion to my own conclusions in many cases.

I watched the movie and found myself agreeing with the unspoken sentiments, I was reminded of all the feelings and anger that was brought about whenever I took the time to pay attention to what is going on, but since I have stopped paying attention so much, and I�m really talking about the last year or so, and I don�t have the constant match to the powder keg in my belly I am becoming concerned with the fact that the powder may be getting stale, the power waning, the conviction dissipating.

I don�t like it, but what I don�t like even more is the fact that if I take stock of what this difference has made in my actions to change a god damned thing, it is beyond negligible.

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