Last night was one of the weirdest nighs I have had in a long time. I felt a little something insomniacs feel... you are not really asleep but you are not really awake. Sleep always amazes me. How our bodies function day in day out, how we handle all the extraneous shit faced throughout the night. We take many things for granted... like sleeping. Which reminds me of my last meeting of the semester with the writing department, by the way what a great meeting. I cannot imagine having no contact with other people. Different minds trigger so many ideas I have that are in a mesh and new ways to look at life. I know this sounds so cliché but I honestly think that sometimes we are unable trigger those ideas without speaking to another human being. Even if it is something so obvious or may seem like common sense. For instance, at the meeting we meditated for a little bit. I used to meditate all the time or do something spiritual but now I do not have the time. The last statement made is just embarrassing to read over, what a horrible cop out.
The professor who is currently teaching "ways of knowing" in the department lead the session. Her voice was very soothing. We were having dinner and she asked us to stop eating and just pick one piece of food. Then we looked at it, we thought about it. We imagined how it would taste if we were to put it in our mouths. We pictured the texture of it, the sound it would make. Then we discussed, were does this piece of, let's say, lettuce come from? Who plants it, who takes care of it, how many people are involved in this simple process of providing lettuce for commercial use? You may think that this lettuce you get at Safeway for $1.00 does not mean much but it does. When you think of how many people work for this one goal and how many people in this world do not have that one piece of lettuce or the money to purchase it... or all the other shit you ignore and I ignore when we eat and sleep and go to class and countless other things. What may seem obvious statements are the things we have mastered to ignore all our lives. We walk and sleep in ignorance. I encourage us and everyone to be aware of how privileged we are and at the same time how ignorant. Tonight, when we go to sleep, thank Allah or God or your parents or this country or anything, for the place you are at and be aware there are many underprivileged people out there who do not have any of that. I encourage us to take action and donate 10 dollars to the people of Sudan who have been suffering a great deal since 2003. The genocide that is happening in Sudan is one of the greatest examples of our Western culture's ignorance. Let's do something as a community and try to break free from our daily ignorant routine.