It's been a while since I have thought about it. Just the space of time that I needed, maybe? I stare down at my copy of it, and think, the first version is better. I should never have second-guessed myself. Maybe other people would have written it in a different way, perhaps it would have been more salable if I had written it according to what gets published nowadays--but I don' t give a shit. I used to give a shit, but now I don't. I shouldn't have given a shit, I shouldn't have cared about what random other people thought, but I did. I shouldn't have done the second edition, but I did.
What is done is done. I can't take it back. People will have to decide for themselves. They had to, anyways. It has always been that way, even if those other people didn't realize it, because they were too affected by what other people thought, just like I was. Maybe people truly can't think for themselves. At least most people can't. We are a social species. At least most of us are. Some of us aren't. I am not. I don't give a shit. Okay, maybe that is a lie. Maybe I do give a shit, but I am trying not to. I am in recovery.
The first edition is better, because it is more true to what I wanted to do in the first place. Maybe it is not realistic, but people who assume that is a bad thing assume that it was meant to be realistic. Maybe it wasn't. Maybe I don't believe in realism as much as I want to believe in it, and definitely not as much as others believe in it. Maybe there is no realism, only subjectivism. We can only interpret the real world, not define it. We are limited to our own subjectivity, no matter how hard we try to prove otherwise. Maybe I subscribe to a different point of view, a point of view contingent on the subjectivity of the writer and the reader, where the two can't meet, since two people cannot ever fully connect mentally in the same way as we can physically, because our minds are isolated from the physical reality of our being.
They aren't really isolated, but it seems that way. We can only see things through our own eyes. We can try to see things through other people's eyes, but we can't truly. We should try, but it is an effort in futility. That's why we should always treat each other as we would want to be treated. That's why we should think really hard before we try to tell people that they are wrong in the way they are thinking, because, they might be wrong according to our point of view, but that doesn't meant that they are wrong, and that we are right. That doesn't mean that we are wrong and they are right. It is all relative.
But what about taking life, you say? That, I say, I don't know. I would like to say that we both can agree that it is wrong, but is it always wrong? Can we know? Just because I think it should be wrong, that I believe that it is wrong, does it make it wrong?
I take a moment to sit back and read what I have just written and realize that I have gotten way off track--or have I? I didn't really have a plan when I set out to write this, so I reasonable can't really say that. It is what it is. I can change it, but should I? Is it better or worse, or just different?
I can answer those questions, but then, I would only be answering them for me and not necessarily for everyone else. That is just the nature of language.
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