Sunday, April 18, 2010

Overheard at BYU

The other day I was taking a break from studying and was eating a sandwich outside on a bench. It was wonderful. The weather, not the sandwich. The sandwich was merely good. About 15 feet away from me, a guy and girl were chilling on the steps. As I was mid bite, I heard the girl say this:

"I mean, they asked me what my interests are. I have no idea what my interests are! That's why I hate filling out forms like that. What are my interests? I don't know. What do they want me to say? Candy. I'm interested in candy. And eating. KFC, chicken burritos, those are my interests. What are my hobbies? Ha, I don't know."

Now the girl was eating a burrito at the time, but I don't know if it was chicken. I also don't know what the boy was thinking - he could have been enthralled with this speech or bored out of his mind for all I know. But I DO know what I was thinking. I almost choked on my sandwich. And it wasn't chicken. It was turkey.

Are you kidding me?!?! You have no pursuits? No passions? No interests? Nothing that gets you excited and makes you feel alive? Nothing with which you connect with society and with this world? Honestly?! Nothing that gets the gears in your head moving? That makes your heart start beating faster? Nothing that brings little gasps of joy or pleasure when you happen upon it? Nothing that makes you stay up really late or get up really early in the morning? No goals? Dreams? Aspirations? Are you so alienated and disconnect from life around you as all that?

It baffled me. It made me angry and belligerent. It made me sad.

It seems like the longer I am alive, the more things I find to interest me. The more things I have to stop in wonder over. I almost have too many passions, and it gets hard to manage all of them. Life constantly blows my mind with the variety, the possibilities, the scope for imagination out there. She is interested in none of it?! Well, besides chicken (Chicken?! The blandest of all meat?!). I wanted to grab her by the arm and drag her around and open her eyes to everything this world has to offer.

Later, I was walking to go take a final and a little boy in a stroller roared like a lion at me. His dad pushing him didn't notice, but I almost roared back. I think I fell in love. I walked to class with the lightest heart and the biggest grin and a sincere hope that there will forever be little boys in the world who will roar at girls passing on the sidewalk.

2 comments:

  1. Hey now...it may not be her fault that she's passionless. I think my passion is looking for something I'm passionate about. Does that work?

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  2. I could smell the fire of burning ditches in Burton all the way from the middle of town. It was bitter and sharp. I have never been so grateful for my sense of smell in all my life.

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