Lately, I’ve been thinking if there is any truth to “souls choosing their birth parents” or some other such intergalactic voodoo---then if one has the fortune or misfortune of being born in The United States, then one has made the choice to forge forward, like an adventurer, and prospect for gold, within oneself and out in the marketplace. Being born here is probably more of a chance thing than a soul thing, and even with this, well, there you are in an individualist-go-get-‘em fantasy land—so with that, you practically have to pull on your pioneer boots, find the best that is in you and sell it across the land. Fight like a dog for as many greenbacks as you can chew into.
But is this really the most efficient use of your time?
Think about sales. All those 0% credit card offers in your mailbox. What a waste of paper. It staggers and saddens, no?
And after seeing Sicko this weekend, shouldn’t we all have basic human dignity? The guarantee that we will not die if we grow ill? Even if we are not rich or even a mild mannered office worker in Nebraska? It does make one want to move to France, the country with the best health care on earth...
As I was flying over the Sierra Nevada Mountains, I had a clear view of Yosemite National Park. Half Dome. El Capitain. Amazing. Yet the mountains were brown, dead brown. I was sitting right over the plane engine and all I could think was, “I fly all the time. And these planes I’m in are just scorching the planet.” I was further scorching the Sierra Nevadas. All I do is scorch.
It makes one think that perhaps Americans need to tone it down a bit. There has to be a way for people to do all that they do without all this aggressive consumerism, this grotesque push for gain. Sure, you come out of that Yankee birth canal all gooey and ready to take the land by storm. And if you don’t, very few people will take you seriously as a sexual partner. People have to change their idea about what is a preferred sexual partner.
3 comments:
I keep looking for ways to scorch less. I feel like our whole system - social, political and just day-to-day life - is set up to encourage us to scorch as much as possible. When you make a decision to be more conscious about it, you start to feel overwhelmed by the logistics of trying to craft a life of less carbon. How to get to work, stay clean, be comfortable on a hot planet, etc, etc. Everything I could do seems to take more money than I have - solar panels, hybrid cars, etc. And paper or plastic? And what would make the most difference? I wish someone who knows about these things - a scientist - would give us a list of the 10 most important things. I'd try for those first. Instead of the highway signs that say 'Report Suspicious Activity' they could say 'Stop driving!'.
Hi Donny! Isn't it stunning the amount of wasted paper and resources -- especially, as you pointed out, the 0% credit card offers that stuff our mailboxes daily? I've started taking the pre-paid envelopes out of them and just sealing them up -- empty -- and dropping them in the mailbox. Perhaps after these people have to shell out a ton of third class mail money for empty envelopes being returned, they'll stop. Of course, it'll take a LOT of us doing that!
David K
Yes, it's what I call the "American Sense of Entitlement".
Sort of a "Manifest Destiny" for the industrial age.
Why is it that Americans feel we have the RIGHT to have whatever we want?
Why do we feel we're not ALLOWED to be inconvenienced?
Post a Comment