II

It all seems very rushed, I know. You must understand, dearest reader, my reasoning that fuels an introduction such as this. There is no subtlety. I am not showing anything, as English teachers are ever so fond of reciting, but I am merely telling. My writing has always been one of show, and the problem is that after I've finished crafting the lyrics and ornament I step back to realize that the needless description stands in the way of my saying anything at all. The literature you currently read is my attempt to rob my underdeveloped ideas of the adornment they hide behind, to force them out of the ugly shadows of frills and riddles and to make them stand naked in the comfortless light. One doesn't fold away a budding flower in the darkness because it has yet to blossom, but rather exposes the bud in hopes that the light will sternly draw the petals out of the scaly enclosure to effloresce and face the day. Professing intellect is something I have always done, and I have always read just enough to impress another in casual conversation. Though I flaunt a feigned acumen my potential remains locked in the obscurity of incomprehension, pushed far into the depths of idle darkness, waiting, praying, pining to be released. There it remains, enslaved by my laziness and piteous fear of the unknown. Honesty is the only hope this small blossom holds. My pretension is one of the many vices that strap my desired capacity deep within my being, and if there truly is any possibility for my progression it lies in the eradication of the facades and delusions I hold. I therefore see no need for subtlety. Enhancement is too tempting an idea, and if I try to show my dearest reader anything I will end up painting a portrait so fair that it bears no resemblance to reality. So I will tell you. I will tell you what I know and what I think. That is all I endeavor to do.

Difficulty is an inevitable entity, and the first difficulty I find in trying to question what surrounds me is a predictable but puzzling conundrum: an answer or conclusion is only as true as the mind used to manufacture the answer. I seek truths devoid of what I have been taught, and uninfluenced of what I have been allowed to see during my sheltered time on this earth. The mind that has been given me, however, cannot be separated from the conditioning it has been subjected to, and thus neither can any answer my mind might come to be separated from the afore mentioned conditioning. I seek to grow past the knowledge of my parents and of my society, but my mind has been crafted by both. Therefore any information ascertained from such, though it might extend past the conventional beliefs of my parents and my society, it cannot be without the influence of both blood and brethren. I go to my conditioning to escape my conditioning, and am left with tainted answers. If each fact and reality is manufactured by the facets of one individual's mind, then it is specific to that individual, and no answer can be universal. No answer can be eternal. Every moment must be spent in inquiry and analyzation of the moment that came before. This is the only state of awareness worth perusing and the only reality worth dwelling in.