Monogamy.

Monogamy: "The practice or state of being with only one partner at a time".  Personally, I've always been a big supporter of monogamy. Most people would agree with me on this. The romanticized idea of being with one person whom you love, and only one, is very appealing to our society. But who really, and I mean REAAALLY, follows this practice? True, a few people do. But it's disturbingly rare. From what I've observed in my twenty years of life, people generally cheat, more often then stay entirely true to one partner.

Even those who never physically cheat, occasionally find themselves longing to experience someone other than their partner. Don't deny that. Why else would they continue to talk to exe girlfriends and boyfriends or have conversations and rondevues with people of the opposite sex that their lover doesn't know about? Why would they flirt, look at porn, or fantasize? Even without the physical act of cheating, you can't deny that there's that psychological aspect... The white elephant in the room. Are men capable of never having the desire to be with anyone other than the person they love? Are woman? If they are, why do they feel the need to push their limits on this?

Monogamy, a concept that is unnatural, and doesn't work for so many people, so why is it even the accepted norm in the first place?

Is it because, as humans, we need to be monogamous to survive? What are the purposes of our beings? To reproduce, to progress, to make the world a better place- are these purposes really dependent on monogamy? Not at all. Most animals in nature are not monogamous. They love and care for their young the same way we do in our society, without the complications of monogamy, and they're been functioning like this for as long as we know. That being the case, why do we choose to accept monogamy as the rightful norm?

Ironically, as I say all this, I'm in a monogamous relationship right now. I'm in love, and it would kill my inside if my boyfriend cheated on me. I trust that he would never physically cheat on me, and I've come to accept that he talks to girls and I don't hear every single conversation. 

But at the same time, if someone wants to communicate privately with someone of the opposite sex, shouldn't they be allowed to follow that urge without complications?  It's easy to ask the question, why do people cheat? But I think that answer it kind of obvious. It's could be any of the following: it's some sort of sick thrill, they want to experience something different, they want to prove that they're still attractive, they became attracted to someone else, they got bored, they got distracted, they got horny, they got scared... Hmmm... But why DON'T people cheat then, if there's so many reasons to do it?

The main thing stopping people from doing more than just communicating with people of the opposite sex, are the elements of respect and disrespect involved. In our society, being with another partner is disrespectful. So we lock up our urges, and don't do it.

I can't speak for everyone. But I don't cheat because I don't want to disrespect him, and in return, I don't want disrespect me to hurt me. With disrespect comes embarrassment, with embarrassment comes hurt, and with hurt... well, it's bad. You get the picture. 

If our society didn't find it disrespectful to be with multiple partners though, then there wouldn't be the hurt and embarrassment involved. Without that, who's to say that anybody would care if they got cheated on or not? It wouldn't even be considered cheating, it would just be an accepted lifestyle... called polygamy. 

In conclusion, my personal opinion: when it comes right down to it, it's very possible that human beings aren't meant to be monogamous. Monogamy could easily have nothing to do with our nature, but be solely a product of the society we live in, hindering us from expressing our true needs and desires, and potentially bringing more pain upon us than we would endure without it. If polygamy was the societal norm, and there was no disrespect resulting from it, what harm could it bring? None, it would just be a lifestyle. However, to most of us (myself included), what cheating represents is so much bigger than what it really is. It represents disrespect, selfishness, and lack of self-control in our society. And with that being the case, polygamy, now, would be devastating. 

Just something I've been thinking about... See you next time,

Sarah

Be what?

It's really complicated, this whole being a good person thing. It has so many levels. Don't do this. Do that. It's confusing.

I remember the day I realized that there was pain in the world. It was a Saturday, in the middle of the day, and I was about five years old. One of our two cockitail birds my mom and dad had as a pet had just died. I didn't understand the concept of death though. To me, it just looked like he was sleeping. My dad had to explain it to me. He wasn't very good at this stuff though... "He's dead Sarah. He's not coming back".

Me: "What?"

Dad: "Our bird, he's going to another world".

Me: "What?"

Dad: (Sighs) "Our pet bird is not alive anymore. He has passed on".

Me: "Uhh ohhh..."

Finally, I was starting to get it...

Dad: "I'm sorry..."

I didn't really know what to think, but I knew what happened wasn't good. Then I asked a stupid question. "Why did he die?"

Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer. That's how it works. "Because everything and everyone has to die sometime".

That one put me into a fit of tears which I can only describe as the saddest moment of my life, the moment I realized when nothing could last, and everybody in the world whom I loved so much was going to die on me. Fuck.

That's the first time I remember ever really feeling pain. It sucked. Soon after that I discovered that pain happens to everyone. That sucked even more.

Ever since then I've tried to be really conscious of everyone's happiness, to prevent pain. I was, as Mahatma Gandhi said, trying to "be the change I wanted to see in the world". This was really simple when I was younger. All I had to do was be nice. So I was nice. It was easy. Then when I started getting older, I stopped caring quite so much. No one else cares, I thought. I kind of lost sight of what I wanted the world to be, let alone what I should do to make it happen. I started to grap the fact that there are a lot of shitty things going on, and I just didn't want to be bothered with them. But that feeling of sadness and guilt that you get whenever you do something wrong would would sweep over me constantly. It's not that I spent my teenage years being cruel or anything, but I could have been much nicer and a much better person in general. I might as well have been, for all the guilt I was experiencing all the time.

Then, I started college, and for the first time in my life I feel like I really started learning something. College has opened my eyes to so many things I didn't understand before. Not only stuff from my classes, but causes I didn't even know existed, and people I let change my life. 

And I'm starting to see more and more things that are worth fighting for. I've never been a hardcore activist or anything, but I'm realizing that you really do need to "be the change you want to see in the world". For me, I'm realizing that it's not enough JUST to have an opinion. I need to stand up for it, and create change because nobody else is going to do it for me. I'll start small though, I'm new to this whole awareness thing after-all.

CHANGES I'M GOING TO MAKE:

+START RECYCLING MORE.

Right now I only recycle the bare minimum, which is ridiculous. There's no reason not to make more of an effort, it's really easy.

+REMEMBER TO VOTE

Not only the presidential elections, but read up on local elections so that I can have a say in what's happening around me.

+STAND UP FOR MYSELF

Often when people say something offensive, I stay quiet so that I don't piss anybody off. But I can be tactful and still voice my opinions.

+WATCH THE NEWS/ READ THE PAPER

I'm embarrassed how little I know about what's going on.

+TRY AND NOT SUPPORT STARBUCKS AND CLOTHING COMPANIES WHERE THEY USE SWEAT SHOPS

This one's going to be hard because I like my coffee, and I like my cheap clothes...

+CHOOSE A CAUSE A CONTRIBUTE

There are so many things in the world that need to be changed. This year I want to get involved in some sort of social movement that is important to me.

+BE A GOOD PERSON

Treat others the way I want to be treated. The golden rule.

+DRIVE LESS

I should start walking more anyways, I need the exercise. 

Ok, I've said my piece for the day. My boyfriend would probably call me a hippie and never talk to me again after reading this spiel. Ok, it wouldn't be that dramatic, but the hippie part is defiantly true. Oh well, people can have different interests and still get along, right?

See you tomorrow!

Sarah

It's my birthday for 14 more minutes!!!!!!

As you might have noticed, I get really excited about my birthdays.

Today I took the day off work and got my nails done. I went to one of those places where, to speed things up, they have one person doing your manicure and another doing your pedicure, both at the same time. I'm not a huge fan of that technique.. too many sensations going on at once to enjoy any of it. And the woman doing my manicure was pretty rude. And I'm pretty confident that she took the entire tip and didn't share with the woman doing my pedicure. And on top of all that, because of the chaos from myself and two women being packed around one chair....SOMEHOW.... my cell phone got knocked into the water my feet were soaking in. The woman doing my pedicure reached in quickly to retrieve it, but now it's not working. Fuuuuckkkkahfaslkhsgrlhkd.

I'm been happier, I'm not gonna lie. 

On the bright side, dinner with my mom, dad, my mom's boyfriend, and my boyfriend was, surprisingly, relatively painless. 

I'm sure you'll be hearing from me tomorrow when I'm at work. But now I must sleep,

Sarah

What's in a Job? Not a lot.

I'm working on a series of "How To's" for work right now. 

....You know, "How To Write an Introductory Paragraph", "How to Write a Conclusion", "How to Make a To-Do List"... that sort of thing. All educational, all rather tedious to write. I have to spell everything out step by step, and put it all in an organized outline form. My most current "How To" that I'm authoring is titled, "How to Use Webspiration to Write Your Paper". It's a pretty detailed tutorial with examples of paper's I've written, and other crazy shit.

These "How To's" are funny because they put me in this position of authority which I haven't done anything to deserve. Who am I to tell people how to do anything? Are people going to listen? What do I know? Not a whole lot...

I guess you've just got to trust me. 

That's the cool thing about having a job, the trust factor. The moment you sign your job contract, you're being awarded a certain level of trust. Trust which isn't awarded to just anybody. You have been carefully screened (although sometimes, not carefully enough) through multiple interviews, resumes, and simple meet and greets. Your employer gets a feel for you (shut up, you dirty mind!) and if the boss is feelin' it (again, not meant to be dirty) you're in.

What's interesting to me about this process is that interviews and resumes really tell you very little about a person. And what they do tell you has only marginal truth to it. For example, my resume says that I worked every summer for the past 5 years at Inspiration Software Inc. It says my supervisor was Mona W. And this is all very true, but what it doesn't disclose is that Mona W is actually my mother, and I completely 100% only got these fantastic internships based on nothing to do with skill, but because my parents own the company. Lucky for me, my mom has a different last name than I have, so no-one would ever expect a family relation... Shhhh...

You can train yourself pretty easily how to preform well, and bullshit, in an interview too. Some people are naturally born with this skill, and for that (directed at those lucky few) I hate you. I'm not one of those people.  I can talk your ear off, but I've never been good with answers on the spot. Needless to say, interviews are not my area of expertise (maybe "How To Lists" are where my only strengths lie)? For unfortunate people like me, there are classes to teach you how to be a good interviewee, and even a much cheaper alternative, which I took advantage of this summer: Google.com. Just look up "Top 25 Interview Questions", concoct and memorize answers to them, and you're good to go. However, at the end of the day, being a good talker and knowing what answers to give says very little about your ability to do a job well. Is this a secret that employers don't know about yet? If it is, another "shhhh..." is in order at the end of this paragraph.

With that being said, one of those annoying cell phone stands in the mall (you know, the obnoxious sales reps that try to get you to switch services as you walk by) was dumb enough to hire me. I tried the googling approach and memorized answers to an array of questions varying form "What can you bring to the team, here at (insert companies name)?," to "If you could be any animal, what would you be and why?"... A flying squirrel, duh!

They ate that shit up. Wow, the world is a joke sometimes. I get hired for some job I don't take, and people who really need jobs are still out of work or working minimum wage jobs, barely being able to support themselves or their children. I didn't even want this job. I interviewed with them for the sole purpose of practicing my interview skills in a real life situation. But they hired me. Who woulda thunk it?

Honestly, I'd be an awful salesperson. I don't know how they didn't pick up on that during my interviews. I'm nowhere near pushy enough, and way too frightened of rejection to approach strangers.

My point? The whole job getting process is a lot of BS, and luck. 

Luck in my case, being that my parental units are connected enough to hook me up with a legit job. Legit enough that I'm blogging instead of working... oops... you see my point?

Just something to think about... It's back to work now for me,

Sarah

I don't know if it's my temporary insomnia working it's magic (it's 3:30 AM right now) or if I was just inspired by Emily, but I've decided to make a blog. Duh. 

I don't really know how to begin this, so I'm just going to talk. Introduce myself, I guess.

Hi. My name is Sarah. It's nice to meet you.

I'm 19 years old, soon to be 20. My birthday is actually tomorrow, in case you care. But I'm not really sure why you would. In fact, I'm not really sure who YOU are and what/whom I'm talking to quite yet. But whatever.

I'm beginning my junior year at the University of Oregon this fall. The past two years of college have been fun. Incredible, actually. I'm so lucky. But I won't get into that right now.

Right now I'm "home", for the summer. If you can call it home. I'm in Portland, OR. It's where I grew up, actually. But since I graduated from LHS in 2006, my mom's moved houses. And now, my room isn't exactly my room anymore. Most of my shit is in boxes, and I'm too lazy to take it out. We'll probably move again anyway. My mom's moved 3 times since my graduation (what is that, 2 years ago?) and she's looking for a house again. Oy vey... whatever makes her happy, right?

This summer I'm working for my parents at their company. They own a company called Inspiration Software Co. Maybe you've heard of it? Probably not. It's an educational software company. I work in this little cubical in a secluded section of their office, miles away from human interaction. Well, maybe not miles. But it's pretty far. I usually see about 3 people when I work, and 2 of them are my mom and dad. It's not all bad though..I actually enjoy the peace and quiet. 

My mom and dad are actually divorced. Since I was 4 years old, to be precise. And yes, they still work together. What a strange world we live in, I know, I know...

Alright, I'm tired now. 

Goodnight,

Sarah