Room to chill

What's up blogosphere. I don't have as long as I'd like to blog today, because I got a fucking parking ticket and need to fill out a damn form for the Air Force. Luckily however, it's Friday, I got a free Redbull (one of many) and my classes end at 10am. That's enough to be happy about.

I remember several times throughout the spring I'd blogged about going to the zoo with Doug. Well I did allow time for that, and Doug and I did go to the zoo recently! While in the African Gorilla exhibit, there was a typical African hut set up so we could see what life is like on a less privileged continent. Those poor people, they have a hammock, and a few stumps to sit on. And everything they owned (pots, pans, buckets of water, clothes, etc.) was attached to a hook and hung from the ceiling.

Doug brought about the idea that if he and I were African, living under these circumstances, we'd make the best of it as we do everything else and be completely happy. He was like, "Bro check it out! We'd have all our stumps and hammocks set up so we could have plenty of places to sit for when are friends come over! We could make instruments and gadgets and gizmos with our infinite creative wit and always be entertained! Just hunting, gathering, and freestyling with our boys when we're done with our chores! And we'd hang up all our belongings so we'd have room to chill!" And when you put it like that, it's like damn Doug that doesn't sound half bad.

As long as you have food, shelter, and love; the rest of your happiness is determined by what you make of your situation. (Now of course this example is slightly flawed because most African countries lack the three necessities of food, shelter and love. But let's say Doug and I were in Botswana where everything's a-okay for the most part.)

So for example, I live in Haggin Hall. The Foreskin Fortress. The Penis Palace. The Bagpipe Barracks. The Crotch Castle. That one. Unfortunately Haggin is usually seen as a third world country. The Christian Student Fellowship does mission trips to Haggin. We see Sarah McLachlan commercials on TV asking you to donate to end the poverty and misery of my dorm. When I invite friends over, their reaction is usually of the "I mean we can just go to my place if you want" variety.

I however don't see my situation like this. I see my dorm room the way Doug saw that African hut. I see all the good; plenty of places to sit, 24-hour bro visitation, a ping pong table that always has bros to put around with, and likewise I always have room to chill. But instead of dwelling on the bad, I make fun of it; the I-know-the-pesticide-men-on-a-first-name-basis-because-I-make-them-spray-my-room-twice-a-week kind of bad.

I'm not just happy about my situation, I'm thrilled with it. And that usually goes for any situation I find myself in. This is the reason that I continue to not believe in "boredom". Teenagers obsess over two things: not being bored, and being able to 'chill'. In reality, the two sensations are identical. They are both defined as the lack of activity, just one is intentional and the other's not. What is the most boring thing you could think of? Would an 11 hour flight from Madrid to Dallas make the list? The way I look at it, there's nothing more relaxing than an 11 hour downtime session. Next time you're bored, just relax; you clearly don't have anything better to do.

That's called making the best out of a situation.


In senior year of high school, my favorite English teacher had us write down a list of 20 things we believe in. A tangible list of things that define us by our beliefs. I completely went to town on the assignment. I had the most well thought out 20 ideas, and each one completely described an aspect of my personality and ego in a sentence. My teacher had us turn these in within the first week of school, and she kept them. She held on to them until the last week of school, after 9 months had passed. She gave them back to us to show us what we most strongly believed in 9 months prior. Out of the 20 sentences I had listed, I still strongly agreed with about 18 of them.

This was an ethics and morals class, and the point of the assignment was to show us that even some of our most strong beliefs can change in a relatively short amount of time as we gain information and experience. But the amount of ideas we end up chucking are typically small. The majority will be the beliefs that are so strongly set in our souls we will defend them for a lifetime.

I still have my list of beliefs, and about once a year I edit it to throw out the few outdated beliefs and throw in new ones. Every year or so when I open it and reread it. I always get goosebumps because by then I had completely forgotten what was on the list. However, each sentence perfectly describes me to the point it triggers an emotional response.

So one of the items on that list, which I had forgotten about until today, was that happiness will never leave you if you possess the ability and security to see complete brightness in a dim situation. That's one of the 20 sentences that describe me, and probably one of the 18 that will never leave the list as it propels me into a successful life.