RUBBLE

RUBBLE:

Anna Quindlen used a term recently in one of her typically well thought through artlicles which I thought needed to be expanded: 'RUBBLE". Here were her words: "Once again we find ourselves planting our flag amid RUBBLE. Now it is the rubble of the American economy, with great financial institutions faltering and failing and the stock market every which way. RUBBLE has become the symbol of this country over the past eight years: the still unaddressed RUBBLE of a decimated New Orleans, the growing RUBBLE on the streets of Iraq".

Yes, I think RUBBLE is the right word for the past eight years. Admittedly, the years leading up to the past eight years weakened the support structures in so many areas, and Bush just used the weakened support structures to RUBBLE-IZE just about everything he tackled with his 'gut feeling' 'born again Christian' John Wayne mentality toward just about everybody and every issue he faced. It isn't just in New Orleans and Iraq that we see RUBBLE.

The dictionary defines rubble as "broken pieces and bits of anything, as that which has been demolished." It isn't just the RUBBLE of our military ventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, there is RUBBLE in much of our school systems, there is RUBBLE everywhere from the 40 yr. useless police war on drugs, there is RUBBLE ever more frequently with loss of pension coverage, RUBBLE from inadequate health care for more and more people, RUBBLE from the lives of those earning non liveable wages, RUBBLE from environmental abuse, RUBBLE scattered in the atmosphere from pollution----RUBBLE RUBBLE everywhere left in the wake of trampling by the wealthiest amongst us on the backs of the non affluent.

It isn't hard to find the rubble----just follow Bush's footsteps, listen to the desolate silence of those living lives of desperate futility---our walking dead, those whose lives never get any priority. It is not just those suffering the brutality of invasions by Bush 'freedom fighters', but those suffering the brutality of genocide across the globe for lack of any Bush 'freedom fighters'---or even air cover from raids on villages by horseback and rickety old planes. The 100 million predicted to die from starvation across the globe in the next few years are but RUBBLE---bits and pieces of that which is being demolished pound by pound of flesh. There is RUBBLE from the widespread downsizing, there is the evolutionary final RUBBLE from vanishing species, there is water RUBBLE from once majestic icebergs, there is the dehumanized RUBBLE found in U.S. jails which house 23% of all the prisoners in the world---RUBBLE which after years in prison is pretty much permanent RUBBLE. There is the RUBBLE of endless lies, distortions, and Illusionary observations of the Bush/Cheney administration which has generated unprecedented anger towards America from so many countries across the globe, including most of our allies. There is the rubble of dead bodies of American soldiers, mostly from red state non urban areas who were lured into military services for lack of job opportunities and assimilated blind patriotism by those around them.

No species has ever generated more rubble than humans and our generation just set the record. I suppose Mother Nature, in evolutionary time units, will clean it all up, and let it serve as fodder for more advanced forms of life. I cannot hope to comprehend life on the grand scale of God's created evolutionary process. The most I can ever acheive are fleeting moments of mellow connectedness with a process, which for me, only exists in a 'little gleam of Time between two eternities'. Seems not a bad 'little gleam of time' for the spinning wheel of luck to have made me a participant. I guess soon enough will be enough for those my age. Funny thing, while so busy with all our gadgets, multitasking, family values, borrowing, polluting, abusing, 'freedom fighting' (if I can use the word sarcastically), profiteering, and babbling on cell phones, all this rubble just sort of 'happened'. Duh.

THE DEBATE HANGOVER

The Debate Hangover:

Well, the debate was over and it was time to decide how I felt about it. I support Obama so it is useless to waste any time here on specific issues. And people react to politics of any sort differently, so my response is, for all practical purposes, useless. I certainly didn't feel like running out on the balcony and screaming how proud I was to be an American. I really didn't know who won since I guess that depends on the criteria you are measuring. I don't think anyone who has followed either candidate was likely to change their mind. So if there was a population out there that counted at the end it was those long time members of the 'know nothing' party, probably the biggest political party in the country. These are the weirdo's who get interviewed on the street by Leno and are so proud to be so ignorant. Their parent's must be so proud of them. Then again, maybe they are the really smart ones---they look much happier than most who know so much more.

I hope those in other countries don't hear or read much of the debate. They are so tired of this more recent androgenic arrogant empire building Uncle Sam, with 750 military bases in 130 different countries, running all over the globe with missiles under his arm, arming or invading sovereign countries with self proclaimed freedom fighters. I suppose Barack was told he had to appear as strong on military ventures as McCain or lose the election. I can only hope it was all bluster for that reason, and he will not really project such an attitude once President. If he does I think it will be out of character. But one never knows. What does victory in Iraq mean anyway? For differing reasons every single group in Iraq is going to hate us after we leave, and since the elected government is demanding a short and definite timetable for us to leave, why were they acting like America is the one who decides that? Or maybe they both do mean America will leave when America damn well feels like leaving. Can't we just stop killing any more of our own people, declare victory, and leave?

The scary thing is that both candidates seemed hell bent on starting up the Cold War again. Our sole goal should be to help Russia and her neighbors get along well with each other. Why have we been arming the Georgians and working so hard to get these countries that border Russia to join military alliances? The Cold War is supposed to be over. If either one was trying to show how tough they would be with Russia if Russia bothered Georgia, they were making fools of themselves to the rest of the world. Look, if Russia just simply attacked Georgia, what are we going to do, attack Russia? Of course we are not. C'mon Barack, you're supposed to be the community organizer, your goal should be to help the Russians and Georgians find common ground and exist as peaceful friends. That is your strength, stop trying to be some kind of younger military soldier who knows victory only one way---through the barrel of a gun---and thinks might makes right, period. McCain is an embittered old soldier who bears the mark of being held captive in an old fashioned war. It doesn't take rocket science to understand why McCain feels the way he does about conflict. Raise the flag and blow the bastards away.

The budget will come down only when America changes her priorities and joins the rest of the civilized societies to fight the global problems common to all humanity. These countries have pretty much stopped participating in our military ventures, are becoming ever more hostile to our obsession with such adventures, and if they have been turned off by Bush, they certainly will be more turned off by a smarter Bush. And if Barack spouts off about the rest of the world the way he did in the debate, other world leaders are not going to be impressed by him either.

So I guess I cross my fingers---this "I'm more macho than you" contest seemed to have amounted to some sort of draw in the debate. Perhaps it served some political purpose for Barack. The most 'macho' of all may turn out to be Sarah Palin. Good thing, she is our first line of defense against Russia---she can even see Russia from where she lives.

The American political process is certainly entertaining. But after a while it gives you a headache.

THE MEANING/VALUE OF SPORTS

The Meaning/Value of Sports:

"And the winner is........". The task here is probably beyond anyone's grasp. I doubt one could get everyone to agree what constitutes a sport, let alone what it all means. Competition hardly makes something a sport. Is politics a sport? If something is competitive but not athletic is it a sport? Football, track, gymnastics, basketball, hockey, etc. are certainly athletic and by any definition are sports. Golf, pool, bowling, etc. are certainly skills but hardly athletic. Walking is athletic, at least for an older person, but even they wouldn't call it a sport---albeit there are walking contests to see how fast one can walk from point A to point B, so sometimes maybe walking could be considered a sport. I tend to view a sport as something which is considerably athletic, requiring vigorous physical conditioning plus skill. Plus skill? Now where does that leave track and field running events? Coaching runners involves primarily recruiting and motivation. Kids show up for crosscountry and after the first practice race you pretty much know who the better runners are. Only 5 runners count in the scoring so most may as well go home right then and there. For the most part you don't develop running skills. Rather, you have running skills and at best can develop some strength and endurance to maximize these skills. So there is a lot of training involved. But all the training in the world can't make someone without innate running ability a good runner. Duh---that's true I guess for most sports.

Whatever constitutes a sport is supposed to build character. I guess some sports tend to produce more 'characters' than others, like basketball and football especially. But defining character is more difficult than defining sports. I think people tend to justify any participation in most anything as a means of developing character. Religion is supposed to develop the 'best' character but anyone remotely exposed to religious 'extremists', 'purists' or 'fundamentalists' is not likely to find much admirable character in such behavior---IF the anyone is not one of them. Many inner city leaders want to find ways to keep kids, for example, playing basketball as much as possible in order to keep them from gang banging. Gang banging leads to a lot of kids killing kids (and adults). But wait a minute---this doesn't really, in almost all cases, provide them any ticket to a better life and escape from the ghetto. It simply protects the rest of us from them and they from each other---for the time being. War 'enthusiasts' justify recruitment by insisting that being a soldier builds character, some people even believe every young person should serve time in the military. Really? Hitler did that and what a wonderful gang of perfected characters that generated. The truth is that everything one does in life affects your character, for good or bad, and like almost everything else, the end results depend on a multitude of factors, all variable from person to person.

Everything about this issue of character gets muddled. Whose character is affected in the most positive way, those runners who often win or place, or those runners who never win or place in a meet? Probably hard to make any blanket statement here. Let's not overplay character development related to being a winner or loser. Look, if winning is so good for the character of the winner, then in reality you have one winner and many losers. But then one could argue, 'it is better to have tried and failed, then to never have tried at all'. Maybe, but sometimes trying and failing teaches some people not to try any more. In life, at any level, for any task at hand, there are more losers than winners, almost by definition. Frankly, if one wanders amongst these losers, one doesn't come away impressed by the character of the losers---not that many losers don't have admirable character in spite of losing. Probably most people do tend to 'love a winner' and that explains why we try so hard to be a winner. As a kid no one could have been less socially visible than myself, an impish nothingburger living out of town as a hillbilly in the hills. Only when I accidently, and not by any self motivation, went out for track and crosscountry, and found I could beat most others, did other peers in the school realize I existed. Must of been my newly developed character from participating in sports which made me more endearing to others. That's silly.

Of course sports can be a valuable learning experience and have a positive or negative impact on your character. Participating in almost anything has that potential including being a member of a neighborhood gang, a soldier at war, being in some kind of career, teaching, playing sports, being a hermit, being members of varied social groups, etc. Life builds character (bad and good), and let's not get silly and pretend that sports is special in this respect. Sports was good for me because it enabled me to build confidence (because I could win) and it brought me in contact with diversity---the kind of people with whom I would otherwise have had little contact. Sports is good, if you are good at it, because it teaches you that hard work can bring results in a short period of time. Working hard at school work might take decades to bring good results. Some activities are especially good SOMETIMES at developing bad character and that includes sports, soldiering, administrative titles, politics, faith based religious extremism, sexual obsessions, etc. Some survive these activities intact or even with better character but they are the exceptions. Success is probably not something some people handle well in terms of good character development. I like to watch football, but nothing is more boring and disingenuous than the player interviews after the game. It's like singing the national anthem at appointed times, you mouth the words, and for most people it is just a required ritual. And for those for whom it is not a ritual, it probably is a bad thing, a sign of blind patriotism, some sort of 'my country, right or wrong'. These player interviews are simply staged, programmed, rote, boring nonsense. It tells you almost nothing about their character. Tikki Barber comes to mind as a good example. Terrell Owens gets a lot of press because he just says what is on his mind---which doesn't by itself make him self centered. When a person is willing to be honest and open about their feelings it gives others a chance, if they choose, to figure out why the person did what they did or said what they said---or, of course, to hate or love them. People really are interesting puzzles, and most people likable if one can understand from whence they are coming. I learned that from a lifetime of teaching---you can't 'judge a book from it's cover'. And we all know that often what people say is not what they mean. I know others often believe they understand what they think I say, but am not sure they realize that what they understand is not what I meant. Human communication is really complicated.

Sports is basically entertainment. Some sports---like boxing---may be very entertaining but ethically repulsive. The purpose of boxing is to knock someone out or bang on their head to a degree which almost always leads to progressively increased brain damage. No parent, considered a good parent, would ever encourage their son to pursue such a sport. And in a world in which violence is becoming more and more legitimate as a means to solve conflict or express anger about most anything, some sports highlight violence as entertainment. Even football, given the size, strength, and speed of many players, is becoming questionable as an acceptable sport. No one can sustain any real protection from a 350 lb player, mostly muscle, falling on top of you let alone smash into you at considerable speed. The number of players with more than minor injuries after every game is rising to double digits. I really don't think I would permit my son to play football these days. Well, maybe I would if I had ten kids, was poor, and hoping for one of the ten to end up good enough at something to support me in my old age. The affluent have pensions (but fewer and fewer) while the poor play the odds by the number of kids for support in old age.

How important is sports for those who follow sports? There is no simple or standard answer.
Some people are huge fans, excited about sports to the point of making themselves raving fools over it. The television cameras always seek out visual proof of these people. My dad watched sports a lot but never seemed overly wrought about any game and seldom, if ever, ranted on about the game when it was over. My brother would scream, yell, accuse, and actively encourage players to hurt each other---"kill him, kill him" . Officials to him were brainless biased nitwits. Some sport followers love to talk sports and the more challenging the talk, the happier they are. Others like to talk sports but back off if they can't win an argument or their predictions are proven wrong. That's what they hate, to be proven wrong. Others prefer not to discuss too much about sports since it just riles up everyone---much ado about nothing. It is not uncommon for friends to lose respect for each other over sport arguments. Hardly anyone is unbiased when it comes to evaluating teams or players. Sports Illustrated is a magazine almost entirely a compilation of opinions about the players in different sports. It really isn't much about sports but about some sort of character assessment by certain sport writers. A player is either worshipped, despised, or ignored.

I tend to follow only certain sports and tend root for a team based on certain players or the coach or the location. Years ago the composition of a team remained relatively stable and there was continuity. Today a good portion of the team is new every year. Most people seek, as they age, to put rooting for a team in better perspective. One aspect of professional sports I dislike the most is the private ownership---a cabal of wealthy, usually old men, left unregulated and free, teamed up with player unions---to rip off fans, cities, and all taxpayers. National sports and natural resources should never be left in the hands of capitalistic greedy pigs at the trough. This is absolutely undemocratic and an abuse of power.

There is not an awful lot of clear logic embedded in sport fan opinions. If anyone has ever listened briefly to sport talk shows this point is obvious. How many people, having taken a stand on a certain team or player, will ever change their mind? It can happen, like with Muhummad Ali (Cassious Clay), but this sort of thing is the exception. We all know, if a player is bad the player is bad, and if he/she is good he/she is good. And we all know who the good and bad ones are in sports. For sure. It's engraved in granite. The case is really closed---shut up or else.

Sports is probably not unlike most activities in life. Participation in, or being a fan of, sports is a good thing if done properly. So is eating, using recreational drugs (not nicotine or cocaine), sex, shopping, betting, working, competing at most things, etc. Life is full of addictions and of course the worse ones are the ones you don't have yourself. These other stupid bastards should be treated harshly for their addictions, their behavior criminalized, and if they don't stop---jail them. Thus we have workaholics, alcoholics, foodaholics, sexaholics, sportaholics, and the list goes on and on. MODERATION in the pursuit of pleasure, or monetary gain, or power seems to produce the best chances for contentment. There may be exceptions peculiar to certain environmental circumstances, in which situations moderation fails. When it takes extremism to achieve justice, society has failed---and chaotic upheaval the consequence.

So who was really better, Willie Mays or Mickey Mantle? There are so many variables involved that only a biased nitwit would think any objective answer possible. Besides, Duke Snider was the best. Some things just have an eternal truth to them.

WHEN YOU'RE OLD ENOUGH TO REALLY LIVE YOU'RE OLD ENOUGH TO DIE

When You're Old Enough to Really Live You're Old Enough to Die:

I think about this title of an old song sometimes. But there is really more to it than that. In your formative years you seldom know which end is up or possess much real wisdom but are sustained by turbulent exhilaration, endless trepidation, and effervescent ebullition. No matter what your mood, it is usually in high gear---there is so much so new, so confusing, so conflicting. With some luck, a good support base, and a decent environment you manage to reach your productive years with a decent shot at reasonable success AT SOMETHING. Inevitably most of us will be destined to carry serious deficiencies or unshakable handicaps beyond our ability to eradicate, and these hurdles make most of us foppish competitors in the game of life. Yet in so many ways, in so many personally diverse struts across the stage of life, many shine during these productive years. Others, less fortunate, probably more numerous, live lives of quiet desperation---how much of it their own making beyond our capability to properly judge. God's evolutionary process is not a process without a lot of tragedy and suffering---an observation which hardly destroys the brilliance of the evolutionary process taken from a broader view.

For those of us lucky enough to escape much of the suffering, achieve modest goals in our productive years, and fortunate enough to enter our terminational years with good health, good friends, and fortunate breaks, this good fortune then demands an obligation to be thankful, thoughtful about our life story, and to then ride gently down the stream to oblivion. Yes, when you're old enough to really live you really are old enough to die. But, once relegated to the sidelines or the grandstand, what you really lose, no matter how good your intentions, or how full of wisdom your thoughts, is the means to effectuate the kind of changes to impact favorably upon the lives of others. It may not be totally lost, but the means at hand become increasingly restricted. I suppose one can try to deny this and make a fool or pest of oneself, but what is, is. The Obama crowd maybe can, and could, if given the chance, but there are a huge number of terminational citizens who see so many things through the eyes of the past, and have lived long enough now to form a huge electorate which tends to vote along the lines of outdated notions and perceptions. Thus, millions of people, who no longer can adapt to changing times, or accept any mindset needed to effectuate solutions to modern problems, vote their hostilities to a world now beyond their grasp. It is like if they vote NO to change, things will go back to a past with which they are more familiar. The truth: you can never go home again.

Democracy is failing now, and failing for many different, but contributing, reasons. The rich and powerful have brought down every advanced civilization in history through unrestrained greed, insensitivity to the needs of the less fortunate, an addiction to power---and with the power came unrestrained arrogance---and with all of the aforementioned came the creation of a foreign 'empire' of one nature or another----and with this widespread entanglement in the affairs of maintaining or expanding such an empire came a prohibitive cost which was unsustainable. An unsustainable empire coupled with massive inequality of wealth distribution at home, leads to internal collapse. The affluent can only live off the backs of the non affluent for so long before everything disintegrates, and the more complex the civilization the faster the collapse. Things unravel pretty fast when so much depends on so much else to thrive.

What is totally unique about self destructing empires these days is the unavailability of any escape routes. In the earlier days of this country there was the frontier. You packed up and moved West. In the earlier days of history people moved from Africa to Asia and Europe then to Australia, etc, until finally all the continents became populated. Now, as things become more and more dicey, dangerous, and unstable, where the hell would anyone or any group run to? We have more now than just a global economy. Most all the problems are global, all humanity is increasingly ending up in the same boat, a boat tangled up with all kinds of ethnic, religious, cultural, and political strife wrapped around ever shrinking natural resources, all mired in human overpopulation, global warming, air pollution, rapidly shrinking water levels, and rising levels of violence---every mob employing violence against each other---with all the mobs approaching some sort of weird level playing field in which the ability of every discordant group across the globe, via modern communication methods, is gaining the ability to organize and terrorize others, all essentially in a fight for a bigger piece of what is left of an ever shrinking pie of assorted goodies. This American election may well be the last hurrah for those seeking a new direction. The disintegration of any society rarely takes place in a straight steady line---a certain point is reached, as it did in the World Trade Centers, when it all just comes tumbling down with all kinds of people at every level of society becoming the victims. The history of evolution is filled with all sorts of major global catastrophes. Of course no one, certainly least of all me, has the foresight to accurately predict how close, or the real nature of the next global catastrophe. But I certainly feel very uncomfortable with the present priorities and mentalities of the Bush-Cheney-evangelical-corporate-military/industrial complex-oil industry-and blind patriotism wrapped in surging violence as the solution to conflict ---- these banded together hateful and short-sighted cabals are currently in full control of our destiny.

Thus, aside from the usual challenges of the terminational years, one needs to adapt to existing in a truly unique and dangerous time in history. I live in the richest county in Illinois and am surrounded by those who see the current economic tanking as just another cyclical and temporary downturn and soon the days of even greater prosperity for the already prosperous will return again to robust amassment of more and more wealth, with wonderful amenities available off the backs of slave labor across the globe. We are now putting a stop to these mindless mortgages with little or no money down and no payments for years at mortgage payments which any idiot knows people with non livable wages could not possibly pay. And thus, once again a robust housing market and good times will return. Oh sure, and these ever increasing masses of people making non livable wages will find housing where? Many already worked two jobs and couldn't afford a house so the solution is what----three jobs? We'll close the borders and eliminate our own slave labor force (we won't really close the borders) and then the cost of many things still made or produced in this country will go even higher. If someone had a magic wand and could create a living wage for all workers across the globe there would not be enough natural resources available for all the people on the globe to live the kind of life many of us now live. That is the clear reality. Overpopulation is real. People can take all of the human contrived religious dogmas which justify total opposition to responsible reproductive behavior, and pray to a God who looks like them, thinks at their level, and waits for their instructions via prayer to bless their lives and their country and their lifestyle---but where in the long history of humans has there ever been such a God so biased, so controlled, and so protective of selected human groups? We are part of an evolutionary process in which fish have the ability to swim, birds have the ability to fly, and humans have the ability to think. When thinking is used to create faith based justifications for unethical, selfish, and greedy human behaviors this is where the evil lurks. The God created evolutionary process has give humans the ability to understand ethics on a level other species cannot. It is not complicated: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" and "fair is fair". That is it. The rest is mumbo jumbo.

In the last analysis those of us in our terminational years need to accept this newest nuance of the aging years. What one cannot control in these years are health problems, even with the best of health habits---loss of friends, family, spouses---any of the situations in the above paragraph, or the point in time our health begins to fail. Now is the only time we own and we need to fill the days with thankfulness for a good life, for the many good fortunes, and think often of those people who contributed to our own success and personage. People build people and none of us are an exception. Now is the time to become more independent, not depend more and more on others to bring contentment. Others our own age will disappear with increasingly regularity, and those in their productive years have a busy life to live and that is as it should be. The terminational years have gotten longer and longer with more and more medical means to prolong our lives. To be a burden on friends or family for decades is simply unreasonable. They will provide whatever support they feel they can or have the time to, and that is the way it ought to be. For me, I seek out and pursue what interests me at my age---and these interests will be unique to me, to my own nature----and to the extent I follow these interests on my own, my level of contentment will be highest. Forget chasing after others for attention and satisfactions, to the extent one can stop doing that, there will be those who will be kind and friendly, and interactive---in large part because they don't fear being trapped. If one is healthy there is no need to be a pest to others, to manipulate them to be a part of your interests, or force them to reluctantly visit, call, drag them here or there, impinge on their own activities, or get in their way period. If one doesn't have interests one can pursue on his/her own, then create them, go do or see things you know nothing about. There is no other time in life except the healthy terminational years when one can do this. The healthy terminational years should be ones in which you really are 'free at last'. If you die tomorrow it is no tragedy. When those in their productive or formative years die, that is tragedy.

Every one, regardless of what some religious groups claim, has the right to control their own dying process. Those who believe God insists they suffer on when they have had enough of life should do just that and let others control their own dying process as these religious faith based fanatics so demand to do via their own beliefs. If dying is not a personal matter I can't imagine what is. If religious beliefs should be respected at any time, the dying process is certainly such a time. I cannot fathom why anyone would want to dictate via laws how anyone else should handle their own dying process. When a person can feel confident they control their own dying process, whatever their beliefs may be, then the fear of death is greatly reduced.

The greatest 'friend' for me, as it has been for many others before me, has been Mother Nature. Mother Nature was there in my youth, my productive years, now my terminational years, and no 'friend' experience brings more contentment and mellowness than to be alone in nature living in a miniscule "period of Time between two eternities". We may not be very significant in the total evolutionary process, but we have been blessed to be a part of an amazing created process that has been able, even through dimly understood perceptions, to give real meaning to our existence. To really appreciate life, to feel any connectedness to God's evolutionary process, one needs connect with Mother Nature, to see past the more trivial much-ado-about-nothing sophistry of human affairs. For the most part the sophistry is all theatre, mostly maneuvering for better position to chase elusive and sham states of contentment. I mostly disappear for hours every day, on my own, observing and absorbing the many facets of this current evolutionary environment and the diversity of life and people scrambling hither and thither like ants, each having a unique and mysterious tale to tell in a world of possibilities so vast and beyond comprehension. Yet there it all is, a large screen three dimensional real reality show. I sometimes wonder, a million years from now, what the world will look like, will humans be replaced or added to by a whole new species? Maybe humans will become extinct and replaced. Or maybe they will just evolve into creatures with capacities so advanced compared to our current human capacities. What will religion eventually evolve to become? But it is no use, I cannot know. We hardly know what we are part of now or how best to fit in how. It is just feels good to be a part of this created process for the present, to do the best one can with the limited talents inherited or developed by association with those who helped build our own nature, and be an observer, finally apart from the pushing and shoving, the competition, the chasing of monetary gains, or power, or titles, or social standing, and oh just all of the evaporative inane nonsense part of earlier years. It all had a meaningful place then but leads to discontentment in the terminational years.

Earlier in life a good case can be made for not accepting the way things are. Change may or may not be possible but the efforts to do so sustain us and bring varying degrees of satisfaction for short or longer periods of time. But the reality is that a good number of people do not have the cards dealt to them to win many battles. These are the pictures from life's other side, those living lives, or dying, of quiet desperation. Most of these nothingburgers go quietly, little noticed, into oblivion and no truly sensitive person can be unaffected by their fate. I suspect most of us learn not to see it, not to feel it---to gate ourselves off, one way or another, from these realities and pretend all is well is this best of all possible worlds. I can understand this, but really resent those who manufacture this term called 'family values' as justification for centering their whole life around their own myopic immediate family needs, or their own religious group, their own ethnic group, their own economic group, etc. You can't turn the inability to practice tolerance and 'fair is fair' into a virtue through the manipulation of smart-ass phrases.

But the terminational years start a whole new ball game. The future then belongs to the next generation. I think old people should only have half a vote, especially given their numbers in our country. The young should not be deprived of a chance to control their own destiny by a massive mob of geriatric terminationists who think by resisting change they can restore the 'good ole days'. The noblest contribution those in their terminational years can make to the next generation is to let go, get the hell out of the way. Whether Obama is on target with his mission of change is immaterial, he'll only lose if the old people can amass enough votes to stop it. For me, whoever the younger generation want, I think they should get. Period. To reach contentment in the terminational years one needs to let go---let go of a lot of things----I mean really let go---and develop the ability to accept, not fight matters that would properly be contested in younger years. Much of what once was central to the life of those in their terminational years is already gone---gone with the wind---and will never come back. It is not that the learning curve has stopped, but now the object is to learn to 'accept the things one cannot change' and these things increase in number the closer one gets to the finish line. Little is less pathetic then those elderly who can't let go, place endless demands on others to placate their needs, blame others for their own inability to sustain a friendship, and essentially just resist seeking out a meaningful life of their own while demanding others provide such a meaningful life for them. Observing life, exploring your own interpretations of everything going on around you, and in the rest of the world, is like putting together a jigsaw puzzle, and as the pieces fall in place (you may have to bend a few) it puts the mind at ease, it brings contentment, it puts things in perspective, it generates an appreciation of life and the God created evolutionary process---including your own life and the melancholic sadness of those less fortunate---and it is healthy and necessary to incorporate this sadness into your own reality----one cannot reach any real contentment using smoke and mirrors or self denial of the inequalities pervasive in our own society. If you can't be honest at the end of life, about a whole host of matters, then there is no way to go gently down the stream and fade into oblivion. The end should be a very personal celebration of the blessings, good fortune, and opportunity for having existed in an evolutionary process that could very well, except for the chance combination of a particular sperm and egg, have never been. Yes, you could well have never been, or been in such way as to be one of those pictures from life's other side. Having lived long enough to see the whole picture one should never, ever, support policies which contribute to the misery of those living lives of quiet desperation. If, in the terminational years of life, one still cannot shake loose from myopic self serving interests of self or your own family, religion, ethnic group, or country, then becoming a bitter curmudgeon is one's fate. At the same time one does not have to go through a second baby period, let other's manipulate you for their own purposes, stifle your own interests, opinions, or lifestyle. We all know those elderly, mostly kept unseen and out of the way, treated like puppets and imbeciles, trained to speak only when spoken to, and ridiculed for any attempted opinions about anything. Just above them are those terminationists whose primary function becomes to serve as props and cheerleaders for other friends or family. To the extent this is the only way they can feel any meaning to their life so be it, but it seems logically pathetic. The terminational years provide an opportunity to assemble all the loose pieces to one's own life, to find missing pieces, to expand the boundaries of your own understanding of matters before limited by lack of time to understand. TIME is what you finally now have, if only for an undetermined time, and there are so many ways to spend YOUR OWN time and pursue YOUR OWN INTERESTS, and meet YOUR OWN NEEDS and better understand the NEEDS OF THE LESS FORTUNATE, and let your OWN MIND wander where it may. It is, after all, the mind which brings contentment, satisfaction, appreciation, understanding, and you can finally arrange your own thoughts to fit your own persona without any obligation to march to the tune of others. To the extent some others are dancing to the same tune,FINE. To the extent some others are not dancing to the same tune, FINE. To the extent others feel you march with or think like them OR ELSE, extend to them the same courtesy you would like for yourself and let them dance to their own tune. Let them be. One of the silliest and most pathetic scenes is old people fussing at each other, playing blame games, teaching each other lessons, trying to cut each other down to size, conjuring up resentments, and all for what? Times change and friends often go different directions and this includes family members, and that is life, and what can never be erased are the valuable contributions, each made to the other, at a different period in time. These past contributions, from so many, in earlier times, made all of us what we became and are. To put them down, because times change and often personas become stale or irrelevant to the time changes, is to put yourself down. These people contributed to what you are and you can't disown or disrespect or turn against part of your own being---that is illogical. People build people and those who built us are forever treasured, if not forever engaged in our lives. Just one more thing to be thankful for in the terminational years.

When you have learned enough to really live you are old enough to die. That of course is true, but deceptive. If one means really live as one lived in the productive years, the statement stands as it reads. There are of course, things we would do different if we could relive the productive years. But when you are old enough to die you are in your terminational years and it is a whole new phase of life. You can't compare apples and oranges. You can like an apple and you can like an orange. I genuinely like each day getting up and deciding what I feel like doing that day, what I feel like thinking about that day, eating exactly what I feel like that day, etc. There are always enough friendly people around, both young and old, to provide any needed socialization---which in my case is probably reasonably minimal. I like people, all kinds of people, and diversity is intriguing to me not an irritant to me. True, most people I like at a certain distance, not right in my face too much, which means nothing except a description of me. I think most people, if healthy in their terminational years, can achieve contentment if they let themselves, at last, be themselves and pursue interests which do not depend on bothering others to cater to these same interests. So many terminationists feel they can't do this or that, or go here or there, unless others can be manipulated to participate. This is a big mistake. Not only do you then become a bothersome knat-like pest, but you will then be obligated to return the favor and do things with them you don't want to do. There will be enough times when others and yourself want to do the same thing, and that will not only suffice, but generate truly pleasant outings. Of course, in the long run we are all dead. Correction: for terminationists it will be the short run. Every race has a finish line. In this case most would opt to turn and run the other direction. But alas, the finish line comes to us and we die. So be it---let inevitability play itself out, go peaceably into an unknown unknoweable night.