in the midst of boredom, i browsed through one of the more popular networking sites just to see who i could find. i ended up finding a section with my high school graduating class. as i click-flipped through the 24 pages of people i pretended to know, i thought about how far we've all come.
there was much digital evidence of success amongst my peers; personal pictures in business attire, of offspring still dowsed in innocence, of those in the wars that i strongly criticized from my living room couch. for a brief moment, i was ashamed of what it was i had become... a man without a story.
during this whole escapade into a self-judgmental session, em was speaking to me about what mattered to her. as my half-hearted rebuttals began to irritate her, i explained what i was actually doing. somehow she understood. we ended up talking about something else when i realized that i didn't actually care about the people i was looking at and that these twangs of jealousy were no more than just a moment of patience slipping past my better judgment.
when i realized what was actually bothering me, and when i came to grips with my own reality, and when my dog took a piss in the corner, i smiled.