"Our Time"

I really enjoyed this read, and as i sit here typing i realize that it's because it has layers. There is a lot going on and there are no definite conclusions. You follow the author and become nothing, but not nothing, just mot yourself anymore, you are following each character as if they were a part of you, or were you yourself. You were floating somewhere inside of them and everything that happened to them felt like it was happening to you, only removed, and less emotional, but still impactual.
This essay was definitely tough sledding at first, but once i figured out the different voices coming through the story became absolutely fascinating. You become absorbed by this world where nothing is quite as it seems where corruption and self deceit hide, laced throughout the story in surprising areas. Everyone gets a chance in this world to be both aggressor and victim, as the characters attempt to bring themselves out of ignorance, misunderstanding, and chaos .

Strangely enough as i was reading this the tv happened to be on and i noticed after awhile that i could hear Edward Norton's voice in the background. i looked up and American History X was playing on the tube. It was weird that this movie should just so happen to be on while i was reading "our time" because they echoed each other in an interesting way although they had two separate story lines. Or rather they complimented each other, fit nicely. I started looking at the Edward Norton's friend in jail who was locked up for 6 years while Derek (norton) only had three and Derek had killed two people.

These are two separate stories and yet when i think of societies horror concerning dope addicts it seems heghtened by the person being black. There is a strange fear of the unknown there. We fear what we don't understand, and it's hard to understand the black man's side in the issue.
Identity. At the base of everything, we based our identities on the color of our skin. We have to don't we? That explains our genetic make up, our past, our history. It says so much about us and yet so little. We still have that chance to break outside the "norm" and yet still be true to our identities. There are other things that separate us all but skin is probably the biggest, next to gender. We even have to meet certain standards in that group in order to be a "member." An African is not an African -American. I heard a woman on tv who was black saying Barack Obama was not black, but instead he was an African-African-American, because his dad emigrated from Africa and Barack's roots are not tied up in slavery, therefore he was unable to understand what it was like to be "black" or "African-American." I guess it's the same as the Irish immigrating to American and not accepted with the other whites. We all have to meet identity standards, or cultural identity standards.

i realized while reading this that i am fascinated by stories of people or groups of people (families) falling apart. I become fixated and imagine this happening in my own family, which leaves me depressed for days after, and yet i'm always more drawn to these stories. I like to think them through from all perspectives, first as one character. and then another, from most important role to least. Everyone matters, because they all played some role. There's common threads throughout all of these stories, starting with a trigger. Some event, usual death, which is the root of all that goes so horribly wrong.
I'm thinking of the Virgin Suicides now. Amazing movie and so perplexing. It starts with the trees dying and ends with the question of why.
I read a similar story of a boy accidentally killing his sister. His family then falls apart and everyone goes their separate ways, all going crazy from guilt and depression. All it takes is one tragedy. All it takes is one external accidental and all you can do from there is watch it all violently explode into eventual nothingness, with only burning shameful, guilt driven memories to guide you along.
It's stories like these that really force the question, is truth truly random and indifferent? Or is this all just the Eye's innocent joke?