Some Things to Think About

"If you don't shut the hell up right now, I'm going to rip out my uterus and strangle you with my fallopian tubes." --Jean, on numerous occasions. Why is it that when we get angry we start talking about our uteruses?

Everybody is a little worked up right now. A month after Christmas, resolutions are failing and reality is setting in again. I warned you about that. But no one likes to listen to me, and since I tend to believe I'm at least partly to blame (because I say so many important things it's sometimes hard to keep track), I'd like to take a moment to point out a few important things:

• The Conservatives can't end the world. Don't forget that across the country there are people whose worst nightmares involve Jack Layton just thinking he has any control, and likewise, some people would have done absolutely anything to prevent the Conservatives from getting elected. In a university environment, I get a lot more exposure to the latter, but when I'm home the former reigns supreme. The middle ground usually wins out in Canada, which is why Mackenzie King lasted so long--he said nothing and did as little as possible. Some things will change, but there are still a lot of people in Canada who will make sure Bush knows how we feel about him, no matter what Harper says.
• Valentines Day is usually worse for couples than single people. I know you don't believe me, but coming up to the 14th of February, more fights break out over the absence of one or the other or both partners on a day that has been commercialized. Don't forget it was named after a guy that was brutally killed for his religious beliefs. No, not cupid.
• January marks the second half of a relatively short school year. If you can get through four months at an unstimulating low- (or, for many of us, high-)paying job, at which you would rather rip out your own tongue, tear it in half, and stick each half in your ear rather than hear the conversations around you, then you can handle 15 hours of class a week and few piddly readings. You don't get a reading week halfway through the summer. You're lucky if you have the energy to get trashed once a week with those people that inspire the tongue ripping.
• Someone you know has it much worse than you do and you don't know it. My old philosophy of just trying to make life easier for everybody else comes into play here. I know, you're dog ran away and your parents won't give you any peace and you are all confused about what you're going to do about that boy/girl/teacher/friend/enemy...and of course, I'm not trying to cut you down for a little self-pity (we all know how much I enjoy it) but chances are, when you are really upset about something huge, you don't act the same way as you would about that little blowout you had with your roommate. Right? So focus outward just a little. Make sure everyone around you is okay. If you haven't seen someone for a few days, give them a call. Making sure the people you care about are still breathing amidst your own sorrows will at least make you seem like a good friend. That means when you really need a favour, you can find a few people who owe you their life or their sanity and let them take you somewhere to get plastered.
  
• Your best friend is probably not the person you think it is. It is not the person you spend every second with, or the person who listens intently to you when you have a problem. It is the person who absolutely insists on staying the whole five hours at a yarn event even if it means you have to walk, hitchhike, or ride your bike back to London. It's the person who asks the dumb questions that force you to give an honest answer. The person who laughs at you for getting all worked up over your disastrous life. It's the person that you call in tears, who shows up at your door and kidnaps you for Second Cup. She is the person who you talked into driving you to a yarn outlet in Listowel, you got lost, compensated with a can of coke, and made sit and wait in a college hallway for three hours so that you didn't have to take a bus to Waterloo, even though you told her she didn't have to take you. Of course she did. It was the yarn outlet for heaven's sake. If you don't have one of those, I pity you so much.
  
• Some of the people that really care about you act like they don't. It's the kindergarten tactic: torment the one you love. I've never been more mad at Shane then when he starts pushing my buttons because I know that he is doing it on purpose. I have a lot more patience for the person that doesn't know how I'll react. What's all this mean? If I'm driving you nuts it's because I love you. What a compliment!
• Everything's wrong, and it's alright. When in doubt, sing a lot of songs that make you laugh. Or, tell somebody this joke: What is green, has four legs, and if it falls out of a tree it could kill you? A pool table. It's funny because you wouldn't expect a pool table to be in a tree!
  

I am so late for class again. I was supposed to work out my essay outline for my Gulliver's Travels paper. Instead, I rambled about things you should already know but that I really think a lot of people have forgotten. The most important thing to remember is THINGS COULD BE WORSE. Always. Don't forget to convert. Your bitter happiness is awaiting you.