do you ever just look at people

tall people, short people, big people, small people, people of all different races and ethnicities,

maybe a teen in a sweltering mascot uniform at a football game, an unskilled comedy actor in a bad 1980s movie, a worker at a mall asking people passing by if they want to test out their overpriced perfume, or maybe some pedestrian in the blurry background of a local news reporter's shot,

and think to yourself,

they've had a worst day of their life

they've had a best day of their life

they've cried before

they've been on a rollercoaster similar to, but not identical to one of ours.

they've celebrated a birthday, either with familiar faces or alone

they have collected millions of millions of seconds of memories in their lifetime,

and no one else in this world of seven billion people can see every one

except them.

it stirs a wonder

as to why other people don't think about this.

but then again,

maybe they did.

they probably did.

but we're people:

humans

mortals with mortal minds

forgetful minds

and in the spur of the moment we forget these things

when we spill an insult

when we forget that who we're talking to has complex feelings and emotions

and that's fine.

because we're always forgetting and changing

changing our minds

our opinions

our relationships

taste in clothes

in colors.

and despite all the change that happens between people

people never change.

we never really change.

change

it doesn't even sound like a word

change change change

the way our teeth and mouths and tongues and lungs and larynx work together to make this thing called a word that means to become different

we change on the surface

but not really inside

inside we're still the same

no matter how much a teenager tells his frustrated girlfriend "i can change. i will change. i will change for you"

he won't actually change.

and it's sad to think about

because sometimes we want to change, but no matter how many habits we may break, no matter how many times we may go to a therapist, no matter how many pills we take, no matter how many days we spend telling ourselves we're going to be different, no matter how many injections of botox you get or how many pounds you gain or lose or how many cuts you have on your shell of a body

people will always be people.

and people never change.

people love people

people hate people.

we're messily beautiful, simply complicated, disgustingly fascinating and through all of the mud and grit people go through

people make it out alive.

from the beginning of humanity there were polar opposites

how have we survived so long?

how in this terrible world have people survived for so long?

it's a simple answer: because we're people.

we drive other things to extinction so we don't go extinct

even if that means other humans

a lot of people say

"kids can be cruel"

but so can they

if something isn't how we like it we change it because we can't change

even if that means other humans

we call these kind of people "controlling"

but maybe that's just because they're more human than us

maybe they're the kind of people who kept humanity going for so long;

leaders have control,

and leaders are the people who change things

who make stands for the change they want to happen because they have a human sense that something isn't right and they feel that it needs to change.

it makes sense

right?

...

we're just people living people-ish lives

we're just people

just people.