As children, we’re told that Santa Claus will give us all the things we want in life if we’re good. We’re told that ‘being good’ is being kind, having a clean room and being honest. 

Then we’re told that our parents were lying about Santa Claus.

We later go to school, where we learn other stories. Where ‘story’ is sometimes substituted with ‘theory’. We’re told that math is important because… Well we’re told that. I’m guessing it’s because it’s the one sure thing this world has to offer. 

No matter what way you look at it (and by grade 12, you’ve looked at it A LOT of different ways), if you have four apples and someone gives you three more, you’ll have seven. Every time.

We’re told to study the answers. That we’re wrong if we don’t write down what the teacher told us to. That we’re unintelligent if we don’t know.

One time in grade 5, I had a teacher give me 95% on a creative project. So I asked a question. Why? He told me that part of the mark was based on neatness, and he could see eraser smears. As I took out more construction paper to redo the area that fell short of his expectations, he told me not to bother. That he’d just find something else.

That you can’t get 100% on a creative project.

Were told that speling &, grammer is important. Possibly because the only thing we know about life, love and tomorrow is what letters it takes to make up the words.

We accept that politics are boring and complicated, that taxes can’t be avoided and that politicians are doing their best to spend their whole lives accepting our money in order to meet up once a month and decide if it’s OK to be homosexual yet.

We’re told that laws are set up to keep us safe by the same people that one time forced us to go to another country and murder people. Sorry… That’s not even outdated yet.

We’re told to be thankful for our freedom. To be proud of being a [any nationality but German, apparently]. That we’re better than other nationalities, but to go easy on the racism.

For just a dollar a day, we can help self entitled white people hand out shoes to African children. For another monthly pledge, we can _______________. 

We’re told that money is the most important thing on Earth. Probably because it’s a sure thing. Because if we have four dollars, and manage to get three more, we’ll have seven.

As soon as we have money, we turn around and use it to buy stories. Anything from a movie ticket to a plane ticket to “I ate the most delicious thing last night.”

As we get older, we transition from the listeners to the tellers. 

We start our sentences with “Did you know”, and fill it in with anything from ‘monkeys masturbate’ to ‘9/11 was an inside job’. The world celebrates the discoverers of new stories, from “What happens if we float across that ocean long enough?” to “What happens if we get deep enough into space?”

We focus all the importance of life on sustaining it, yet we’ve accepted that we’re all going to die. There are oodles of stories about what happens after that. Even though most of them are good things, death is treated like the ultimate tragedy and we’re quick to give back all the money we’ve earned in order to avoid it.

That or we go into negative money. Which technically shouldn’t be possible.

I think the biggest flaw in humanity is our inability to look at each other and see our own reflection. That, or it’s the inability to look at ourselves and simply admit that there are things we do not know. Or it’s the inability to accept each other’s flaws. Or maybe the inability to accept our own flaws. 

Because the only truth in any of this (other than math) is that we are human.

And what is human, if not an individual attempt to find the right balance between learning the stories of others and creating our own.