Skeleton Friends

There is an interesting quality about being human.

We are, after all, simply collections of particles, of materials. Flesh constructed atop slender figures of bone; a network of electricity wired to make our heavy limbs move. We're all made the same way, out of the same stuff, with organs that function in the same ways. All our DNA coils like the pictures in the textbook; and when broken down, we are all simply atoms.

A few nights ago I tried to force myself into this simple scientific framework- it's an eerie thing to experience if, just for a moment, you see your friends as matter rather than people that you know. As the television cast its brightness into the dark living room, I saw my hand, brightly lit, illuminated blue. I imagined the framework beneath my skin, the skeletal hand, and how I could move it on my own accord. I glanced to my left and saw five of my friends friends- all chests rising and falling to different beats of equilibrium.

I imagined them all sitting there- but only in muscle form, and then as skeletons- I didn't like it. To be honest it was kinda freaky- BUT.. it really did make me think.

First I thought about how strange it is for us, these figures of flesh, to care for and encourage one another. To make each other laugh. To hug and hold each others hands. To have thoughts and feelings. I thought about what it actually means to be. So much of what makes the people we know are things that we not only cannot see, but are utterly intangible. Emotion, personality, character, spirit; things that are sometimes so inexplicable; completely individualized.

Many times I envision people shaped- less like figures of flesh, and more like vases; their hollow centers filled with life, light, spirit, and an innate longing for something divine. There is depth in the human character that stretches far deeper than the depth and width of the human skeleton. And it is such a perfect and beautiful thing to behold.

I haven't really come to a conclusion about my thoughts on this, except that it astounds me.

"Untold millions of people run and run,

constantly seeking, grow desperate and die

looking for the light that is within them."