a manifesto

Yes, I'm a dreamer. I believe being a cynic is the worst possible thing for a human being to be. While you hide from the world I'm laughing and crying and shouting and whispering and talking until I lose my voice and drinking too much and helping my friends who've had too much and meeting interesting people and missing connections and wondering what it means. I'm loving and hating and living--and enjoying every single minute of every single day, because that's what life is.

In the movie Shadowlands, C.S. Lewis says "We read to know we're not alone." He was almost right, too--except he neglects to mention that's also why I laugh and cry and shout and whisper and all of those other things. Every moment is a triumphal affirmation, shouting "yes" as loudly as I possibly can at the world, at everyone and everything around me.

What have cynics and misanthropes ever done for me? Have they ever talked to me until five am on the phone and made me feel happy just to be alive, feel like I've really connected, watching the sun come up and realizing that I just ruined tomorrow to talk to this person, knowing it was worth every minute of lost sleep? Have they ever stumbled home with me after too long of a night out, laughing at everything? Have they ever smoked a cigarette with me on the back porch of a party, unwinding together after a crazy night with adventures already starting to blur?

I spent too many years as a cynic, hating everything just a little more than I hated myself, living life as if it were something to skulk my way through, no hope, no future--convinced I was deprived of that would finally bring me joy.

Then I started dreaming again. Then I became powerful--and I will use that power. For love and hope and everything that's beautiful out there.