A Letter to the West

At times, when one is alone a bitterness creeps in, and so it was that in the dim light of the motel room, mostly lit by the fluorescent neon sign outside, he put his pen to paper and wrote away his contempt for him.

'You know, I'm tired of you. I'm tired of you and your problems. Your silly problems. Your problems at work and your problems with your parents and your problems with your friends and your problems with your relationships. I'm sick to death of them all.'

'Here you sit, with all of this, living here, in this wonderful place, and all you do is complain. Complain about how hard done by you are, how unlucky you are, how unfairly treated you are. How hard life is, what a struggle it is, how terribly difficult each day is, what with all these awful circumstances with which you are forced to contend.'

'Well I'm tired of you. I'm bored of you. I really want nothing to do with you. Let me ask you, just for a moment, to stop looking at yourself and take a look at what goes on in the world. Look across a few borders or a few blocks and see what others go through. Think of the man who just heard his wife was shot in a robbery. Think of the girl who was just shot in the crossfire while going to the store. Think of the woman beaten to a pulp by her drunken husband. Think of the child lying in the hospital with his arms blown off from the shrapnel. Look and see the death and the horror. Look and see your death. And then, if any of it sinks in, and it dawns on you that every one of us is going to die and that all that matters is to let us live, then please, write it down, and use it to remind yourself every time you think of complaining. Because you're making me sick.'

He felt better, but he knew it was not him and it was really himself. He tore up the paper and threw it to the fire.


- posted by Sigurd8/25/2004 03:43:00 AM