On standards and lowering them

I've thought about the topic for quite a bit. This has been sitting on my to-write list for a month at this point. Let's get at it. The paragraphs ahead might be more frank than the usual content.

I was talking to a couple of people last month about what was up with me. Unusually for these times it wasn't me who started that particular thread of conversation. Two friends from very different circles told me I had high standards. Which is strange because my problem is not, has never been, is unlikely to be ever ever be, having too many options to choose from. Or reject options. Or have any choices at all. On the contrary, my circles have been getting smaller as I grow older, people that were in my periphery getting coupled or married, and all the places where people met or got to know new people gone.

The Island of me is not one with many ports. It's one with none, separated from mainland by a large ocean, one of lava, that nobody cares dares bothers wants to cross. The sandbeaches where a landing party could safely disembark are melting away into the lava. It's a pretty pretty island no denying that, but there's little hope for connection to the mainland, the archipelago.

Carving away at the steep cliffs is not helping anyone with anything. At most it's a good way to keep oneself occupied while waiting for time to erode everything away anyway. There are no safe harbors, a Caribbean island this is not. Despite the palm trees the mojito fountain and a large statue of a semi-naked divine entity that is visible from every part of the island.

What now.

Maybe things are going to be alright. After all life thrives grows adapts and adjust in volcanic undersea vents. Volcanic ash is incredibly fertile, it gives way for new life, a new ecosystem to arise. It might look like hot lava maybe it's just boiling water. The world is a strange place. Surely there are people with low enough standards.

And also, what do they know, people all set to long-distance and marry the first person they dated. They've not seen enough of the world to make reasonable judgments about what is fundamentally broken unfixable wrong with other people.

I sure hope so.