Why I care about life.

I used to live my life in a place of quite day-to-day survival. What I mean is that in high school I was just waiting for high school to be done, I had no plan or idea what to do after that, I just hated life in high school, so I wanted to leave. The sad part is that all kinds of life happened around me, but I chose to stay at home, watch TV, eat and get fat. Part of me is sad to talk to my friends and listen to what they did during high school; it makes me sad that I was there, but not there. That I was present, yet it was as though my mind was asleep.
One of the greatest things that happened to me was that I joined the military, not that I have this great love for the military, or loved my job, or that I really liked where I was. The great thing is that I was forced out on my own, that here I was a 19 year-old kid and I was given the job of making sure that a 280 million dollar plane and the four crew members took off and landed safely. I was given a goal, a purpose, and a reason for living. Basically, I grew up, or at least caught up part way from my sluggish start. Still, no matter how well I did my job, no matter how busy I kept myself with other things, all I was doing was living till my four year commitment was done, and I could leave.
I had no passion, no life, I saw other people searching for some kind of life by chasing girls or drugs, and I just wanted no part of it. I prided myself that I never got angry, that nothing could bother me. I had built a nice safe little moat around my life, the scary thing is that I could date someone, get physically involved with them, yet not have any kind of emotional attachment to them. I was a textbook “guy”, I had become the thing that I hated. I was so far out of touch with any kind of emotion, that friends would die, and I would not shed a tear, I crushed a girl’s emotions, and did not bat an eye. I was a cold-hearted bastard. I looked down on these silly people who would let their life be run by something so silly as an emotion. I saw it as a flaw that people would get upset, or angry, or care about other people. I saw love as nothing but a silly word that ignorant people use to get anther person into bed.
Another sad thing is that I carried this attitude back here with me, not as callous, but just kind of killing time, without a purpose. A funny thing happened to me, I ended up falling in love. I was sick in love, a strong realization came to me, I cared about something more than I cared about myself. Something or in this case someone was way more important to me, than my own personal goals, or life. This was a revolution of an idea, to be in a place of caring about someone else so much that it would hurt. It drove me to do things and think of things that I could do for her, I became passionate about life, about living, about her. I know that this all sounds like a load of crap, but it was the way that I felt. The grand thing is that this kind of passion, this LIFE just ended up flowing out into the rest of my life, there was no part of my previous life that was safe from the effects of this new found passion for living. I found the greatest joy in cooking dinner, or writing a letter, I became crafty, and started to just make things. This “fire” did not just relate to her, she and I ended, but the cool thing is that my newfound desire for life did not die with her, it was just whipped into an inferno of passion over the rest of the things in my life. I found that my life was something to be excited about. That is the keystone of this paper, just trying to let people understand that there is more to life than just taking up space, than just breathing. Find something that your passionate about, and do it. Why are you still reading this, GO, NOW, Do something!

M@
"I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out
in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a
superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and
permanent planet. The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall
not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time."~Jack London