Birds Perched on Pachyderms and Outdoor Electro Parties (Part I)

This life is all about connections.  The people we meet, the people we know, the people we idolize and the people we choose to ignore, the people who we allow into our tiny little worlds will influence the quality of our lives, both in the present and future, more than we could ever know or predict.  The relationships we forge, whether they be superficial or extremely intimate, will open some doors and close other, will fucking knock down walls and build doors to rooms you couldn't have imagined.  Or maybe they'll just tear the whole goddam building down and start from scratch.

In college, I always balked at the idea of it; the frat boys and business nerds called it networking.  It always struck me as fake, seemed to cheapen the human experience of actually knowing someone, of sharing secrets and memories and learning the most wonderful and terrible things, and knowing that they know these things about you as well. To network, I always thought, was to strip interaction of its beauty and emotion and leave only the cold and mechanical; friendships operating on a trade and barter system.  I have this to offer...see...I am a desirable person to know.  Let me look upon your...ahhh yes!  You have things that I need!  I'll trade you mine if I can have yours?  SIgn on the dotted line...voila!  Friendship!  

It is, as I once believed, the social equivalent of Go Fish.  Relationships are business transactions.  We are birds perched on pachyderms.  Mutualistic Symbiosis.

But now I am learning (slowly but surely, I swear that I am).  It is impossible to fall in love with everyone, it is unrealistic to invite every person I meet on a subway train or in line at the bank to my birthday party.  There are some people who will remain a business card in my wallet or a contact without a last name in my phone.  But even these people, these small and seemingly insignificant acquaintances, have something to offer.  I believed, once, that by accumulating these acquaintances I was acting insincere - that I was collecting the human equivalent of baseball cards, that I was simply keeping these "friends" in holding patterns until I could find a way to exploit them or make our relationship work to my advantage - but now I'm beginning to realize that we are all climbing the same mountain.  I will take your hand now, and tomorrow I will give someone else a boost.  We are all clinging to each other, a tottering mass of a billion arms and legs all clamoring to go up and up and up. 

We put ourselves out for the taking, and we must in turn take what we have been offered.  We can do nothing in this life by ourselves.  

We are all in this together.