How Can You Think That Way?

Does it ever strike you that there’s a great big world out there and you’ve seen hardly any of it?

Oh, maybe you’ve been to Disney World or Niagara Falls, or the Grand Canyon. I’m talking about spending time in places away from those tourist traps, as marvelous as they might be the first time you see them.

What about Europe or Asia or the Middle East? What about, at least, reading a book in which you might meet a character or two that aren’t like you? Different skin color, different way of speaking, different religion, if you consider yourself a religious person.

I guess what I’m getting at is that there are many of us who refuse to do our homework, make the effort, refuse to leave the nest and admit that there is more than one valid way to understand the world, to look at life, to make it through the day with your head up and your humanity intact.

I’m not fascinated by ignorant people. I don’t feel sorry for them anymore, if I ever did. I’m tired of them now, beyond annoyed by them, because they seem like caricatures, like they can’t be real. And they are the way they are, in part, because they’ve never ventured beyond the zip code they grew up in. They’ve had the bad luck of being stuck, of listening to the wrong people for too long, being told one too many times that life is hard and no one cares and someone else is always to blame.  

I’m not sure how this all fits with the people we elect to Congress. Many of them are well heeled and well traveled, and yet they say things that make you wonder if they aren’t somehow damaged, if they have the capacity to see, to learn, to think for themselves or muster even a small amount of compassion.

We can’t have a boring existence, though. Heaven forbid people should be bored.

It takes all kinds, I hear. But not if some of those kinds are just ignorant assholes. Some peoples’ stories need to have more chapters.