stretched out and shrink-wrapped

a friend asked me about lebanon. what do you think about this israel/lebanon thing? he said.

where's lebanon, anyway? i said, after admitting my lack of opinion.

before you stare, i do know where lebanon happens to be located. i must confess to a bit of cheek here. i have a way of asking flippant questions about things that seem or are insignificant in my life. jessica simpson? who's she? oklahoma? where the heck is oklahoma? as if the existence of such things held no claim to shelf-space in my brain.

of course this is selfish. of course this is ignorant.

jessica simpson is a person just like all the rest of us and no doubt she has many virtues worthy of notice.

oklahoma is probably a very important and beautiful place to some people. that's cool.

but i was born to ask questions. my favourites are why? and so what?

so... why is it then that i feel no urge to figure out just what is going on in lebanon? why am i not scouring the newspapers and glutting myself on current events? does my hunger to know things not extend that far?

perhaps it's the unsolvable nature of wars in far off places. perhaps the hopelessness of ever figuring out what exactly is causing that pain, what exactly is driving that hate... perhaps it's not worth my attention.

it's like this with sports too. there is an insuperable lack of interest there. i just don't get it.

so what am i talking about? a lesson in tolerance? of letting people who enjoy sports just get on with it, and people who must fight one another just get on with it?

maybe.

my dad always said 'live and let live.'

and surely nobody in lebanon has ever heard of me. surely they do not want for my attention.

perhaps it is enough for me to know people are people. people fight.

people believe in things.

should and shouldn't might have everything to do with what opinions i might form. but, regardless of the fact that i can't see lebanon from here and they can't see me, opinionlessness is a comfortable chair. i've always liked it.

i had another friend once tell me that all my hard-hearted apathy was just a facade. that accusation had me staring at the wall, blankly, for several minutes.

he was right though. i am no stoic, whatever i may pretend to on paper or in words.

when last semester a neighbor pulled out his lap top and showed us pictures of little iraqi children, my insides went all stringy to think what it must be like to be them.

but i'm not them.

i'm just me.