Look out the window.

Seriously, look out the window, please. Jut don’t forget to open it first. All done? Is the sky bright blue or steely grey? Is the grass emerald green or dusty yellow? Are the people outside talking to each other, gloomily walking home or running from the rain with shrieks and laughter?

Now, close the window. Look at it. Not through it, at it. At the lint stuck to the glass, at a couple of stains left from the recent spring cleaning or at the dust looming in the corners. Or, if you live in a family that is as obsessed with cleanliness as mine, at your reflection.

Here comes my last request, and that’s it. Now, without opening the window, look outside. Look carefully. Does the grass look the same to you? Can you hear those two guys on the bench talking as clearly as before, when the window was open? Is the sky all that blue?

I’ll dare to answer that for you. No. Because of the dust, the grass is tinted a slightly different shade of green. You can only hear small parts of the conversation. And the sky…the sky is stained, its blue isn’t half as deep and saturated as it was when the window was open.

Where am I going with this? You see, to me, the sky, the grass, the conversation are all a metaphor for reality. It’s everything you see every day, everything that happens to you, your family and friends, people you don’t know, the world on the whole.

And the glass is the social opinion. It’s what people around you think about the said world and the way they describe it to you. You can’t judge the opinion itself, you can only judge what things look like through it, this glass that is supposed to help you form your opinions and superstitions.

Different occurrences require different kinds of glass. For some things it’s cleaner, for others – filthier. But, no matter how sparkling, it still doesn’t let you see the whole picture. Things are distorted, even if ever so slightly.

The same way, society can make even the most innocent thing look vulgar and dirty. Or just forget to tell you some of the details which, in hindsight, turn out to be crucial to the story and make it look completely different.

In the end, the choice is yours. You can either look through the glass or open the window. Take notice of the things people tell you about what they think on this or that, but, eventually, if you have to, swipe their opinions out of the way.

Like I said, it’s up to you. As for me…humpf…it’s so stuffy in here…would you mind if I opened the window?