My head rests on one hand as the other grips a pencil, filling in the answers to a test. My thoughts flow from my head down into the pencil that I hold. Tracing their familiar shapes, my conclusions spiral onto the page. I look down at the next section, one where I must determine whether the statements below are true or false, my least favorite type of test question. It's hard to assign an answer so concrete and final, so.... black and white. If you tell me something is true, I will make it my sole purpose to seek out an exception, some inconsistency. Tell me something is false, and I will squeeze every drop of truth and goodness out of it that I can find.
The sharp contrast between black and white often leaves me feeling uneasy, its lack of shades feels somehow incomplete. The distinction becomes more blurry as my mind pulls me away into the gray areas. Nothing can be left unexplored. For even in the darkness of the night sky one can find stars. And though the sun lights up the day, there are always spaces that its radiance cannot reach, creating shadows. I must wander among the stars, hide myself in the shadows. In these places that choose to be different from their surroundings, I will discover how colors can be blended and distance can be mended.
For now I will fill in the answers to this test, identify the truths and falsehoods around me and hold firm to what I believe. But I have also learned to never stop questioning why things are the way the are. I don't want to lose the hope that maybe things can be different, maybe things can change.
The sharp contrast between black and white often leaves me feeling uneasy, its lack of shades feels somehow incomplete. The distinction becomes more blurry as my mind pulls me away into the gray areas. Nothing can be left unexplored. For even in the darkness of the night sky one can find stars. And though the sun lights up the day, there are always spaces that its radiance cannot reach, creating shadows. I must wander among the stars, hide myself in the shadows. In these places that choose to be different from their surroundings, I will discover how colors can be blended and distance can be mended.
I cannot make my home in the gray areas for their walls would be too fragile, filled with uncertainty. Yet still they draw me in to find common ground between all that disagrees. Even when the truth seems clear, it takes a journey through the gray area to understand another's point of view, to reconcile our differences and make peace when colors clash. No, we shouldn't compromise on what we believe, but when we only see things in clear black and white and refuse to explore all that lies in between, we are missing all the shades that can give an image such great dimension and depth.
For now I will fill in the answers to this test, identify the truths and falsehoods around me and hold firm to what I believe. But I have also learned to never stop questioning why things are the way the are. I don't want to lose the hope that maybe things can be different, maybe things can change.
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