I think I’ve got it.

While “writing” this paper I’d really rather not be writing, I was instead thinking on the apparent injustice of doing things we don’t want to do. One, that this feeling is extremely childish, and I hate myself for considering it, for being so foolish. Two, because everyone has to do it, many much more than others. Most in this world have to work the asses off for little reward, just to survive. This is more unjust, I think, than me having to do a stupid paper. I hate myself for this as well.

But I was also thinking a lot about religion, again. This past Sunday I attended a black Baptist service, and I have to tell you, it was extremely interesting. There are somethings that one simply can not understand without experiencing them, and the black experience in America is one of them. I got a tiny taste of it in this church service… incredible. Essentially, faith is used as an energy source, a point of security that African-Americans can hold on to in their lives, much more so than other groups, I think. Anyway, back to the point I’m trying to make…

We work for our paychecks, we work for our grades, we work for any accomplishment. But when you have to work just for your life, for the lives of dependents, what is the reward? Survival itself is no reward, and neither is just living. We are thinking and feeling creatures, capable of great cooperation and success, capable of seeking out a “Why?” So when life is so harsh, so difficult that it’s all many can do just to earn a meal to eat and a place to sleep, never mind such things for their families, I get confused and frustrated.

An afterlife makes the toil of this life mean something, it’s the ultimate goal. In a way, this belief makes it easier to make it through life. I think this is another meaning for what Marx meant by religion being the opiate of the masses…

I struggle to find this kind of personal meaning, especially when life is often so tough. We work, time ticks on, then it’s the end. And for what? I wish I felt the reason why. I can think it… I can come up with dozens of reasons. But I don’t always feel them, can’t always know.

So yeah, there you go, retro-Andrew style post, instigated by an ending of another semester in college. I hate the end, even of middle-of-my-life things, because they’re all foreshadowing the ultimate end, and I hate that.

I needed to get some of that out of my system.