I find it easy to admit that I know very little of African history and culture. That's definitely bad and something I should fix in the future, but I don't think it's my heart of darkness. If I had to talk about my own heart of darkness, I would say... anyone living under the poverty line, period. (Which is, well, a lot of people.) Maybe that's a bit unspecific, but it's true. I don't understand, at all, what that's like. My biggest problem right now is which college I'm going to get into, not whether I'll get an education at all. And that's sort of what I mean by the narrator's description at the beginning of the beacon of civilization-- I am almost always so absorbed by my own life, with my nice neighborhood and good school and constant access to food, not to mention a thousand other things, that I forget that there are people without those. I forget that so much of what I have is built off people living in a 'heart of darkness' and that I'm really only here by chance. Even this post is more of an exception to the rule; I am going to go back to all my mundane worries as soon as I hit publish. I suppose that's pretty horrible, but that's the way it is.
I think it was really wonderful of you to admit to yourself and to the blog what I think is true for most of us who write for it. And although it's probably true for most of us, It's still uncomfortable to talk about, which contributes to it being our heart of darkness. Rather than going back to leaving it in the dark, why don't we shed light on it? Cycle it into our daily worries, and maybe with each day, we can become more aware of it.
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