Jogging through the ruins

Imagine Greece or Rome at the height of their splendor. Musta been pretty dope, especially considering the alternative - "barbarian lands", IE, anything outside the Polis proper. But all cities fall, eventually, and so I give you redshirt's Thanksgiving 2008 trip to Delphi:

Funny story. I missed the 8 AM bus cuz I went to the wrong subway terminal because apparently with Greek written in English you can spell things any way you want, and so the travel book sent me to the wrong station and even after sprinting, I missed the 8 AM. No problem, I thought, Delphi is open till 5, according to the same travel book. Plenty of time to explore. I catch the 10 AM bus and arrive at Delphi at 1. O hai! Winter hours, we're closing at 3. And so commences redshirt's quick jog through Delphi.

Some columns and tumble down stone and brick. Hop-hop!

Bitchin' amphitheater dudes. Also, vertigo. Hop-hop!

Whoop-Whoop! Top of the hill, home to the Delphi Rams. Fun fact! This stadium was a late addition to the most Holy sacred site of Delphi, a Roman construction. Leave it to the Romans to bring football into the Vatican plus Mecca and Jerusalem combined, figuratively speaking. Savages.

This is it - the Oracle at Delphi. Her temple, at least. Imagine those pillars extending all the way around that central stone structure, with a kick ass roof too. And then imagine standing within such a temple, overlooking that view, on some stormy night in 450BC and a General and entourage arrive in the dead of darkness, seeking prophecy. And some lady would give it to them, high on gas, and thus history unfolds.

Fun fact about Delphi you may not know! The site was not only the location of the famous Oracle, but also served as the bank of ancient Greece. Each major city-state had a building on site dedicated towards storing their wealth. Athens, Sparta, Corinth, you name it - if you were a city-state of any shake, you had gold stored at Delphi. Twas Holy, after all. And who better to protect your money than God?

After the War

The Sarajevo Winter Olympics awards platform. In 1984 it was the scene of triumph. A few years later, target practice. Such is the way of war, swiftly ripping away hard fought gains in culture.

Like ski jumping. Seriously, think how luxurious it is to live in a time when we build huge structures so people can ski jump off them, and we do so at an intense level of competition.

Now see them as you stumble out of the woods chasing a rabbit for dinner (in the far future), and you come across these two stone "bridges?" to nowhere. What strange magic men of old once practiced!

Aye, magic. Look around! But war can take it all away, and not just bombs and guns and tanks and such, but economic and cultural war can be equally destructive. Once you lose a certain level of civilization, for whatever reason, there's no guarantee it will come back. There's only so much any society can take before it breaks. Such has been the fall of all great empires, all nations, all peoples, sooner or later.

It can be delayed, with wisdom. But all things fade in time.

Profiles in Manhood

Ah, men (human and alien). The cause of, what? 98% of the world's problems? All the wars, by far - by far - most of the crime, the violence and murder, the wanton cruelty of the powerful over the powerless. Men - if you had to exclusively and effectively profile one group, skip the Arabs or Russians or Chinese; profile every man - we're the cause of all the trouble!

For example, alcohol, and foolish behavior. Men excel at this, imbibing both with gusto. For example, chugging. Here's an oldy but always a goody:

A wonderful piece of art - please note the very partly consumed shrimp flying through the air. You put that much liquid into a semi-permeable container and at some point - quickly! - it's gotta come out.

Freudian Field Day, Chicago, 1983

I presume the Patriarchy was only fully established with the first cities, which by necessity required power structures to operate, and these were all run by men. From there, success leads to success, power leads to more power, and 1000's of generations have lived a massive dichotomy: Men run everything, and are the cause of all humanity's problems. Maybe it's time for something new?

Let's go Matriarchy! Women would do a better job of running everything, since they've got more in the game. Sure, perhaps over time, women with power would turn into bloodthirsty monsters bent on crushing all their enemies. But perhaps they would not! And that's better odds than with men, with whom we've had an ample sample size.

But alas! Divide and conquer does indeed prove ruthlessly effective, and all it takes to keep women from rightfully taking over is a small percentage of turncoats, or, in this case, women drinking alcohol, acting the fool.

Rock n' roll!

We Are Defined by What We Kill

Hey Beauford! What say me and Jimmy Bob pose on this here giant hill of buffalo skulls and you snap one of them new fangled flash pictures?

Have you heard about this? Read about this? The wanton killing of buffalo in the American west in the late 1800's? Vacation train rides you could take where you'd just be poppin' off out the window, cold killin' buffalo for kicks. Fun for the whole family! And for why? No good reason really, just cause the buffalo were there, so easy for the killin' - they were practically asking for it.

Now, compare that mindset, just some 100 years old, with a comparable attitude today - for example, there are many re-population efforts of buffalo going on across the west. 

Progress! Right? It seems undeniable, and this is but one example. For it's true: You are defined by what you kill, and each and everyone of us MUST kill in order to live - this is in fact a definition of life, in my opinion: To kill. For fuel, of course, but killing is killing. Everything alive kills, and so the question is: Do you have a choice in this?

Yes, we humans clearly do. And so we have all kinds of weird diets, as expressions of our humanity. It's quite wonderful, I think, and presages even greater progress in the future.

And this is but one area of progress. We are becoming environmentally aware; equality is a real fact, and a growing reality across the world; racism and bigotry are battled across the globe. I could go on, but I hope you see, despite the seeming insanity of American politics and how that shapes the entire Earth, we are all - collectively! - making great progress in advancing a progressive attitude for all humanity. Respecting each other and the world we inhabit, this is our collective future. Not the distrust and rapaciousness of the past.

There will be setbacks, and those that refuse to go along. Some of these people/groups are quite powerful and will do everything they can to thwart our common success, but they are few, and ever dwindling, and if we can avoid a destruction event, the forces of progress will simply overwhelm such conservative roadblocks.

The future is ours! So remain strong in the face of the Insanity and Lies launched by the rear guard Morans of the American Right. Their time is over, and we are but witnessing the death throes.

And yes, we can define ourselves by killing regressive attitudes, like slavery, cannibalism, ritual mutilations, etc. 

What's heartening is this energy of progress is relatively new, born from the hippies, I would think. And never forget one of the first effective symbols of this new awareness:

 Please don't litter. Seriously. You'll make this dude cry. You don't want to do that, do you?

If you're not with the flow, you're against it

Yeah, I know, I know: Times Square is exciting, and there are a lot of bright and shiny lights. However, it's also filled with people. So, tourists of the world, wherever you go, try and remember: You're not Julia Roberts and this world is not made for you. So before you stop in the middle of a busy sidewalk to look at your map, or take a video of a statue (?!), why not first step out of the general flow of traffic, and then do what you have to do? It's really not that hard, and will usually only add a couple of seconds to what you want to do anyways.

Furthermore, and this goes for all Americans: Why not keep to the right, in all situations? We drive on the right; most people in a city will walk on the right - except for those few folks who seem unaware of this general convention, and will happily plow upstream against a flow of people. I always wonder: Do these folks not get that they're going against the general flow, or do they not care?

That appears to be a fundamental question concerning all human behavior: Don't know, or don't care? Seems to me the answer explains most every impolite behavior.

Robot Preacher

10. Dearly Beloved we are gathered here to join
   12. INSERT MALE NAME
   14. INSERT FEMALE NAME
   15. IF CA OR MA, PREPARE SUBROUTINE :GAY WEDDING:
20. INSERT RANDOM PABLUM ON MEANING OF LOVE AND MARRIAGE
30. Do you?
   32. IF NO, PROCEED TO SUBROUTINE :WEDDING DISASTER:
   34: IF YES, PROCEED TO 40
40. Do you?
   42. IF NO, PROCEED TO SUBROUTINE :WEDDING DISASTER:
   44. IF YES, PROCEED TO 50
50. I now pronounce you husband and wife!
   52: IF CA OR MA, PREPARE SUBROUTINE :GAY WEDDING:

Yay!

No Standing

Brooklyn, 1976.

I have come to the firm realization recently that indeed, the 1970's were the best. Miss ya seventies! We won't see anything like you again in my lifetime.

Living in Paradise

If you could step back and think about it from time to time, you'd realize we, in what we call "Western Civilization", have had it pretty good for the past 50 years or so. Historically epic, in fact. We're pretty lucky to be living the miracle.