Bound

We're ALL bound. we're ALL trapped. i'm no different. i realized this sometime towards the end years of my dismal high school performance. when i was in grade 13, ya laugh it up. when i was in grade 13 is when it really hit me the hardest. the boundaries we all set for ourselves. you know it all starts in the later years of elementary when we start to form cliques and we all become afraid to act differently from the "rules" of our cliques. we set our boundaries. before you feel like this is just a problem long forgotten, you're wrong. this is just where it starts... blatantly anyway.

high school i spent being "not me", well i didn't know "me". my hair has not felt a single drop of gel since, the earring came out and i stopped bathing in cologne. i stopped hiding my ideals and my idols that were not necessarily a part of the make up of the clique i belonged to. the fear of loving nirvana and the smashing pumpkins as much as pac and big faded. i no longer felt fear of letting it be known that i loved things that i wasn't necessarily supposed to love because of my previously set boundaries. FUCK YOU! (punk phase commenced)

The thing is, we form these brotherhoods as a need to belong. it's human nature to want to belong. which is fine but it's also in our nature to dismiss or condemn. we want to belong so much and when we find our haven the next step usually is to exclusify (is that a word?) ourselves. we're this group, you're that group. YOU SUCK! why do we do that? we're not satisfied simply being a part of a brotherhood so we have to antagonize the other brotherhood.

We started with land. i occupy this country, screw yours. and religion, this is mine, yours is absurd. and then even within our countries and religions the division never seems to end. i'm catholic, fuck protestant. i'm liberal, fuck conservatives. tables and chairs! in darfur where they're all muslims, the arabic muslims are wiping out the african muslims! (not that i'm upset with saddam being taken down but are the do-gooders really doing all that well when more obviously severe situations are getting worse?) the natives had it right. they considered land as we consider air. it was for everyone, no one could claim it. wishful thinking.

I'm not ashamed of being canadian by any means, there's a million worse places to be born. but the only reason i am has nothing to do with me as a person whatsoever. although being canadian has obviously had an effect on who i've become. i hope i'm not confusing you. my mom gave birth to me here, that's it. you can call me a sikh but that has nothing to do with me whatsover. my parents were sikh. i don't want to wear my jeans well below my ass, tell me i don't love hip hop. i hate indian pop culture, i find it to be idiotic, so when i express this view, i'm whitewashed. you see where i'm going with this? why can't i be part of this as well as part of that? why are there boundaries withholding me from letting me be completely me? why can't i be both? why can't we all be one and at the same time be different? because we're bound. like Common says, "i just wanna BE."

suggestion for a new year's resolution: BE BOUND-LESS!