We all rest comfortably in the normalcy of being able to trust no one. We indulge in the fact that we don't necessarily have to take the time to open the door for the person behind us. We adore that we can't beep the horn at the elderly pedestrian crossing the street and speed off without any sense of remorse because we can mark it off with a simple, "It's 2016, so what?"

I'd like to take the time to thank a special group of people, with whom I never associate myself with because of the perceptions I have grown to have of them over the years. We look at people who sit down next us at a bus stop and scoot over two centimeters or so, enough so they won't notice, but enough so we feel better about ourselves. We look at our peers with a judging eye that prevents us from getting to know who they truly are or seeing our common differences. We blind ourselves by who they were and not who they are growing to be, and the truth is we are all constantly growing. We are all trying to find ourselves, or at least enough ourselves to find out who we are trying to be. In this process, we neglect what should be one of our biggest motivations: our community.

We all come together whenever it matters, and then all of sudden we forget that person we hugged even existed the very next day. The momentary smile a stranger used to give us when we'd pass by, even if we were on the wrong side of town, was something that made a person feel safer walking down the street. Sometimes, maybe we are looking for the wrong key to the lock that chaos has on the world. When the right places to look are in each other. My grandparents never failed to remind me that in their time, their entire neighborhoods were disciplinarians to all the kids on the block. Could you picture that? The ratio of an entire neighborhood, to one child.

Now, try to picture the ratio that could save our world, one village at a time.