Experiment in the Human Condition
It all started on September 11, 2001, with watching an airplane smash into the World Trade Center. One of the people in our callcenter screamed, she was on the phone with someone in the first tower when the first plane hit. She thought it was a bomb.
I saw places where I knew people, people I loved, people I knew, places where I had been just weeks prior. Gone. Destroyed.
I was lucky, I have family that works in the Pentagon. My step-father was working there just 2 weeks prior. His office is now charcoal.
That day, I cried for the first time since I was 12.
I don't think it was healthy, I was already having a bad day, and I snuck into my car, in the boiling heat, and I just sobbed.
Enraged, saddened, overwhelmed, I couldn't make it stop, not when I wanted to at least; The damage was done
I realized that day that I was doing something unhealthy for far too long, that I wasn't allowing myself to live, to do the things that I discovered were natural. To cry, to love, to hate, to lie, to be human.
And so, I decided to try to figure out humanity a little bit. If I had been so dis-illusioned about who I was, how could I presume to even begin to know humanity?
So, I've stopped talking as much (in my former life, I was a chatterbox), and decided to really, really start listening to people.
The flip-side to this experiment is the loathed day-log.
I decided it was the only good place where I could post my reflections (which are incredibly self-centric right now, but I assure you, there is a reason for that), in a place where people could see the progress of my experiment.I've been "interviewing" people as well... asking a variety of questions.. nothing really very specific, just questions that I think help define who a person is. Right now, my favourite method is the "Top 5" list game... you know it if you've seen High Fidelity. That seems to be going well. As soon as I find the "Top 5" list, of top 5 questions, I'll put them on a web page, and start compiling lists, and statistics... Then things will get interesting (in other words, phase two of this sucka begins).
Links so far:
- September 21, 2001 - The start of it all
- September 22, 2001 - Tired
- September 23, 2001 - Exhaustion
- September 24, 2001 - Depression