July 25, 2000    
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What has been your greatest disillusionment so far?

Discovering that we hardly live in a free society in America. It seems to me that the government is sapping money from each person at every chance it can discover. In order to own a dog, build a deck on your home and countless other activities, a person must ask permission and pay fees to bureaucracies and committees that exist to solely to collect money and approve/deny requests. Some day I expect to have to seek permission to plant a tree, buy a chair, light a candle. And the whole gas crisis seems like a show - the news stations makes a big deal out of how the prices are exorbitant, and how the big fight will be fought to lower them this year, and downplays the situation when the goverment nixes a bill that would've lowered them.

Jesse, 24
Bowie
, MD

My greatest disillusionment with have to be with every politician who says they are going to clean up government, and then become like the people they criticize.

Ernest, 29
Washington
, DC

Thinking that just because someone says they are a Christian, that they are a good person. Many so-called Christians are hypocrites.

Melodi, 19
Hlliard
, OH

That so many people lack curiosity or compassion or common sense.

Jill, 59
Saylorsburg
, PA

My biggest disillusionment is that I somehow beleive that wanting and needing to live my life as an artist will reap great rewards. As I am still hanging on to that, maybe I am not totally disillusioned. In a close second is my strong belief that California is the dreamscape that is so carefully documented, the place that continues to draw my attentions, my "grass is greener" place. A world made of pyrite rather than gold. It continues to make a fool of me.

Tina, 31
Medford
, MA

Physical "reality"

Megan, 24
Chicago
, IL

Besides Santa Clause, believing in time.

Jami, 27
Lowell
, MA

When I discovered life never promised us that it would be fair, or just, or always kind. But there by grace, it would be tempered by love, punctuated by joys and somewhere along my path I would find a hand to hold and a gentle smile to light my way.

Rick, 50
Stephenville
, TX

That finding a compatible mate whom you love and respect and is your best friend, isn't enough to make a relationship last and that sometime all of that is defeated when the life paths of two people are just not heading in the same direction.  And that the young do die.

Felicia, 34
Somerville
, MA

That God is a moral creature.

Socrates One
Lowell, MA

My greatest disillusionment to date is the way in which our president is being elected. And, I might add, our choices. The man who is presently in the white house has embarrassed our country and he still sits in a place that represents our country among the nations. His good deeds, so to speak, do not impress me as I imagine they don't impress the world. I just hope the man chosen will be good for our country and its people.

Gwen2, 51
OR

Unfortunately, my wedding. I have always been so obsessed with weddings and feel I had been planning mine since I was 10! My expectations were very high! It turned out to be obnoxiously expensive and it went so fast! My mother (who I'm very close with) left the wedding before the cake was served and never returned. She couldn't handle seeing my dad for the first time with his new wife. That really sucked. I haven't really had a good feeling about the wedding which upsets my husband. We don't talk about it much. Plus, my arms looked fat in my dress. Here I had a zillion dresses to choose from, and I pick the one that accentuates my arms (the least favorite part of my body). Thank God the honeymoon was awesome!

Susan, 31
Chicago
, IL

I just can't understand why Ross and Rachel can't seem to work it out and get back together.  Oh yeah, and Man's inhumanity.

Anthony, 25
Baton Rouge,
LA

My greatest disillusionment so far has been the fact, that though I believe in something that is stronger then ourselves, I have always known, inside, way inside, where it is hard to hear, that there is no god. And that the bible is just a story. A story for the people that just do not get the fact that we are to live in harmony, and not, people who take.  Constantly taking from others and rarely giving back to others (others as in society,family, friends, strangers).

DJ
Pt. Dover, Ontario CANADA

(a good question, a hard question, one that's sorta hard to answer just right. . ..)
. . . that people are much more simple and dull-witted than I hoped, as an adult they'd be. . . you stick money and sex in front of most people and you pretty much can get anything you probably could ever want in this life. . . it's very simple and reminds me every day what real animals we all are, despite our better, more noble intentions. . . .

mothmc, 35
Los Angeles
, LA

The fact that, despite all my trials and tribulations, the world 1) doesn't really care, and 2) doesn't really WANT to be saved.

Amy, 23
New Orleans
, LA

Learning that life isn't fair and that very bad things happen to very good

Jane, 60
West Linn
, OR

thinking i was in love and actually allowing myself to go through with the charade for several months.

Angela, 16
SC

I have found many people that only care about themselves. We are taught as children to care about others and many adults do not. I think it has to do with greed.

Kristy, 24
Indiana

That people are never what you perceive them to be

Emma, 20
Perth AUSTRALIA

*cynical scowl* Life in general. You know, I used to be this happy puffy perky person. And I still would be if Kid Rock's bit about "you get what you put in and people get what they deserve" were true. But it's not.

Karen, 20
Marshelltown/Ames
, IA

When I was about 4, my grandmother told me that the wild flower fox-gloves are poisonous. For years I was terrified to go near them and was really frightened of them. Then my father told me that they're harmless. I still don't know why she told me they were poisonous - she's not some crazy old woman.

Shanna, 15
Cardiff ENGLAND

That I would grow out of being who I am.

Firelady, 22
Dallas
, TX

Yesterday / Tomorrow