CRASH, changes, what’s the road to heaven paved with?

Just watched CRASH… great movie, glad that this was recognized and it won an Oscar. We know we live in a cruel and unequal world, but I suppose in order to survive we push those thoughts aside and focus on the task at hand… figuring that it won’t do to “think too much”. This movie shows the anatomy of karma: how our unconscious actions (‘cause we’re too busy focusing on our own stuff, or trying to prove some petty point) will spawn other actions that will eventually come back to you. Shows the depths of human cruelty and the heights of human goodness… I’d like to know why God made us with these highs and lows… why not just make us all-pious or all-wretched? Why these two extremes residing in the same mind and body? (and please don’t say “imagine how boring it would be if we were all the same”)... suppose she knows best and may or may not reveal her point someday.

Helped a friend and her family move from an apartment into their first home this weekend, prompting all sorts of nostalgia. We made really great memories in that apartment… it was my first home in Joberg, it became a ‘squatter camp’ at some point, with 7 of us in a 2 bedroom apartment… We were 3 women, 2 of them control freaks, and me only allowing my control issues to show when I’d grown out of the ‘visitor’ phase… Discovered that it is true: women’s periods do ‘sync up’ when they live together… forget whose pheromones were the dominant ones. Went through my generous and consumate chef stage there, where I’d make elaborate meals for all 7 of us daily. Learnt a great deal about team work and genuine friendship, and about my own depths and heights. Time has flown ‘cause in the ensuing years, the original couple got married, bought the apartment, had a daughter, got good jobs, and bought their first house. All this has made me pause and cast a quick eye over my life's milestones. According to me, myself and I, we’re doing pretty well… according to ‘society’ I am performing very poorly. Human beings being social animals and all, and with the individual being driven to ‘fit in’, I suppose I should get started on the road to social acceptability round about now.

Speaking of being socially acceptable, I’ve been collecting different views of what it takes to make a successful relationship. Some folk I’ve spoken to have been categorical in their view that “you never end up with the one you want” and “it’s better for him/her to love you more than you love him/her”. When I first heard that, I looked at the people telling me this and thought “and you are really quite serious about this?”… Well, the more I heard it, the more I started to get convinced that I had clearly read one too many romance novels and would do well to get my feet onto the ground pronto… “just be stoic, and suck it up with a man who is not-the-one-you-want”.

Don’t get me wrong, I have a very healthy respect for arranged marriages - at least the ones I know of - and totally believe in the whole ‘learning to love’ as a feasible option to ‘love from the start’… a good number of my Indian friends bear testimony to the workability of this approach where cooler, more experienced heads (professional matchmakers) find you about 5 different options, you get to pick one from the 5, and you both give it the old college try. I just have a problem with mismatched affections, and think that all those selling that ‘you can make someone love you’ crock should be shot. Why? Because there are folk who buy it and then decide to darken the doorways of those who don’t buy it… an unhappy experience for all involved, and a reminder that the road to hell is paved with good intentions…. So what paves the road to heaven?