So we find ourselves in a time that could be considered precarious at absolute best. Many times throughout history, even our most recent history of the last one hundred years, we find ourselves exactly where we are now as individuals and also as a collective whole. Economies rise and fall; they are built by nuggets of trust and faith and shattered by trysts of tyranny and greed – institutions and men that may, or may not, be aware of how or why or what they are doing but in the end destruction and/or chaos are the end result. Plausible deniability is a name badge at this speed dating luncheon known as global finance for individual gain.How easy is it for us, in this time, to run around all Henny Penny and commit to the falling sky? I am quite sorry to announce to everyone and all that the sky is not EVER going to fall. True, it may change shade or hue, it may evolve it’s density – hell, it might even explode with the fire of a failing Universe, but it is not going to fall. To be honest, even if it did fall, how can one man or billions of men hold up the sky on their backs? They can not.
We brought this upon ourselves as much as we had it forced upon us and just like any other challenge of global shift. We gobbled up growth and opportunity and ‘realized fantasy’ with the verve and vigor of a school child’s gluttony facing down a dozen pillow sacks of confections gratis. We went about our business with no sense of repercussion; we lusted instant gratification and ‘they’ (big government, World Bank, The New World Order – ultimately any Big Brother organization with all of the designated power) took advantage of that just like any other Three Card Monte dealer on any metro corner of America.We took on loans with ’stated income’ applications. We bought houses because we wanted or ‘needed’ them, not because they were sound investments. If anyone, with a serious face, can justify to me the price tag of 500,000 – yes, five hundred thousand - dollars for an eight hundred square foot condominium in an average suburban neighborhood, well, then I will gladly sell them ice cube recipes via my email at a retail value of approximately $759 plus a $99.95 processing fee! We put no money down and increased loan terms from ten to fifteen to twenty to thirty years and sometimes even more in order to satiate our need to keep up with the Jones and/or rub the little guy’s nose in shit. We bought into interest rates nearing ‘zero’ when all logic would tell you that no one on Earth is going to loan you money and expect almost nothing back even if that ‘almost nothing’ is paid out for an eternity. Ask anyone in Southie about the vig – NO ONE ON GOD”S GREEN EARTH PAYS ALMOST ZERO PERCENT INTEREST ON A LOAN OR BET WITH OUT THE WHOLE SYSTEM CONSUMING ITSELF!
Long before petrol rose to almost five dollars a gallon we were buying gas guzzling monstrosities while gas rose from under two to over two and up over three only to kiss the four dollar mark and then begin to leather clad up five dollars and get out the whip and zipper mask while we all starting bitching like madmen cursing the cards for our fates and not our actions. Texas Hold ‘Em should tell you that it never is the cards but rather the choices you make with them in reaction to your opponents actions. We all ‘needed’ fuel. We had places to go, people to see, fellow drivers to impress, kids to make proud. Very few (almost uncountable amounts) of us made the change with the change; we all kept buying, claiming some sort of false defenselessness based on a perverted base of ‘need’. We ‘need’ to get here, we ‘need’ to get there, we ‘need a shiny ‘dependable’ car, we ‘need’ our rides ‘pimped’, we ‘need’ a bigger car to carry all of the neighborhood kids in order to perpetuate suburban heroism – all the while we never, ever, once asked ourselves the question of what we really, REALLY, ‘needed’ in order to accomplish our responsible place of existance amongst our fellow man. It is like the young adult who buys fancy clothes in order to look good but then bitches about eating Top Raman.
Food is no more expensive than it ever was, we are just more detached from where our food comes from. None of us make an effort to grow any of our own friggin’ food and in doing so it is easier to ask for extra green sauce when you get to the squawk box or to roam the markets like a zombie seeking brains all the while bitching about how you don’t have two cents to rub together. I can remember being with my father as a child and growing our own pumpkins for Halloween, making stir-fry dinners with our own bok choy, having grilled cheese with fresh tomatoes from our garden. Hell, at one point the old man had goose eggs and chicken eggs and a goat on his little pseudo metro down town multi-family property in Peabody MA. Our goat used to be stolen from a crazy Portuguese women around the corner that wanted to butcher and eat the friggin’ thing and we would have to go reclaim “Zorba the Goat” (the inevitable spit fire dinner for this women’s family) by force, but I digress. If you are not going to participate in where your food comes from then you have no one to bitch to when you go into the market for a five dollar gallon of milk.
I understand that a lot of people right now are suffering with the economy and looking for answers. There are plenty of idealists of youth that have looked around in their inexperience and begun to bear hug ideas that reflect on a falling sky. I am neither of these people. About twelve years ago I told everyone I knew that this was coming. I was working night crew grocery and explaining to guys that the house market was a dangerous game as the prices began to elevate beyond realism. I told them that fuel was going to clip the wings of the bald eagle. I was not a dooms-dayer but rather a realist that was trying to offer good advice to good people making bad decisions. As a result of my skittishness I am in the best financial shape of my ENTIRE life. I do not have savings or investments or ownership of property, but I do have all the money I need to eat and live and smile and be happy in general. Hell, my daughter is getting the biggest Christmas of her life and most people who own far more than me and have invested thousands will be having a sparse holiday. It is because I did not try to keep up with the Jones – they were delusional. Never keep up with the Jones – unless it is 610 Jones of Rockport MA!
It is easy to blame. Blame is the easiest escape when it is one sided. Everyone wants ‘accidents’ to be ‘incidents’ in order to have blame be on the silver serving platter and to avoid the issue of circumstance. When circumstance enters through the gates of instant gratification via the road of null repercussions, then we begin to slide down the slippery slope of regression. Fear is a powerful tool used by both extreme sides of this argument. Fear is what defeated Napoleon. Fear birthed the KKK. Fear killed ALL indigenous people. Fear drives big pharmaceutical. Lack of fear is dangerous but it is also what drives genius. From Einstein to Kerouac to Leary to Jefferson to Moses; “No Fear” may be a slogan on a sticker but there is something to be said for it. But again, it is delicate. Lack of fear in the wrong hands leads to stupidity and the worst actions known to mankind. Just watch any ‘man’ show of bloopers or any deluded action of men like Adolph Hitler or Hannibal or Vlad the Impaler, or Genghis Khan, or George Bush or Bill Clinton. “Jackass” sums this up with perfect intent or any cover of celebrity rag mags that gossip on gossip. “Batboy Feltches The Corpse of Bob Hope While Brittany Watches” is a great example of this taken to the ultimate extreme, and while it is a farce, it is also a good point of how such an extreme then justifies mainstream media’s points as fact and not blown out of proportion ridiculousness which most of the time it can be.
This is a time of self reflection as much as it is a time of ‘revolution’. Remember, the “revolution will not be televised”. We need, NEED, to change who we are in order to make the change as a whole. We need to be conscious of what is happening and how we effect that. The blinders must come off. Eyes open wider than wide could ever be. If wealth is power and control in our Capitalistic Democracy (freedom achieved through economic gain) then we need to watch where our money goes. Did we not learn our lesson during the roaring twenties and the “gay” teens that led to nothing but the depression and the second World War? I guess if everything is cyclical than the fifties are coming up and I will finally own a house and drink Bosco again.
Some say the end is soon and that the camps are coming. Some say that the World will end. Some say that everything is fine and that it will all rebound with heat. Some say that the fate is in a God’s hand. Some say that chaos is the key. Some say to hide. Once, long ago, some said that the world was flat. The Mayans were deceived by the second coming of Kukulcan; I will not be.
When you drink and eat too much one night and head to bed, you normally settle in real quick and go to sleep. Inevitably the gas kicks in in the morning as you drift in and out of slumber. It normally is the most nasty stench you have ever taken in nasally, but as the light of morning hits your eyes and the stink flutters about, you find a comfort in your many smells. No one likes shit but everyone ought to wake up and smell their own or the world is going to need a honey wagon the size of the Universe.
Think before you act. Never be too comfortable. Speak up and speak out. Always think that you are wrong as being right is the worst thing that you could ever be.
Godspeed …
