Apathy

Today is the day that our society has agreed is about spending our resources to show our affections. It's the day where we have our fights, we eat our sweeties, and have a socially required and contractually obligated kiss. Perhaps we even make awkward love with the rest of our geographic area. But despite all that snark I've put into this already, I'm not bitter.

Because to be bitter, you have to care.

And for the first time since I understood what Valentine's meant and the first time as an (arguable) adult, today is just another Thursday. There's no magic that I feel I'm missing out on. There's no fairy tale I feel I'm owed. It's another day. And... that feeling is the most transcendent apathy I have ever felt. It's left an empty space where all that care, concern, loneliness, and obsession has been left to rot over years and years. And today it feels cleaned out.
Fresh.
Unsoiled.
A hole that can be filled in with whatever I want it to.
And today I will fill it with the beauty of Thursday. I will treat it as my first and most glorious Discordian Holy Day. For it is the very fact that today is without meaning, that gives it the most beautiful and glorious meaning.

But anyway. I'm sure you're reading this for my thoughts on Apathy. As it's the title and all.

Apathy is another of those things that is lumped in with the worst of humanity. And generally speaking, I think that it is rightly so. A great deal of the suffering in the world boils down to people's inability for an empathic connection or understanding with people they have not met. The bonds of human kind should be enough to have us all take care of and love one another. They really should.

But they aren't.

And as horrible as this may sound, I don't think they should be. Because caring for all of the billions and billions of human beings on this ball bouncing though an uncaring cosmos is too much. Add all the other animals and you're moving into the realms of madness. Caring for everyone as you do yourself is something only a Christ or a divine Mother Goddess could do.

And frankly, I am nether of those things. (I know. Total shocker. You'd think since I look so good in a dress... but nope. Nether of those things.)

I don't feel nothing when I hear of atrocities or the suffering of people far away. I just don't feel that much. It's usually over in a flash. Because I've trained myself to use my Apathy as a form of protection. I know that I'm immensely sensitive and feel things in deep and profound ways. So I have to be careful about what I allow myself to care about. So I pick and choose. I make the horrible decision that many others fear and I decide who I can care about and who I can't.

Now not caring doesn't mean malevolence. I don't wish ill on people. I don't wish suffering upon them. To want bad things to happen itself implies that you care. And I only have so much give a shit.

So when it comes down to it, I only take the energy to care about what I can actually make a difference in. I'm working to devote my life to special needs pre-schoolers in at risk populations. I've supported and helped out every person I can even when all I could do was offer them a shoulder and ear.

I am not an apathetic person. But I can see why it's important. Why we haven't breed it out of ourselves just as of yet.