Reading and Thinking

I've been reading a lot lately.  Finished the James Hockenberry novel "Over Here", read through the August edition of National Geographic and began the September edition, and continued my reading of the summer edition of Lapham's Quarterly called Fear.  It has helped that I have taken advantage of the many vacation days I have built up over the past 2 years, and that the nice weather has encouraged me to read in our sun room rather than plopping down in front of the TV in our living room.

Some of the things I have read about include the disturbing fact that close to a billion people on Earth still defecate out of doors, resulting in sanitation risks that create the needless deaths of tens of thousands of children a year.

That a private sector space race is in progress in an attempt to win the $20 million Google Lunar XPrize by being the first privately funded group to land a craft on the moon, travel 500 meters on its surface, and beam images of its trip back to Earth.

That new research into the workings of the brain is revealing an amazing connection between addictive behavior and brain activity, specifically in the area of dopamine release and interceptor cells.  Research that is inspiring not only new ways to look at destructive behavior, but some innovative approaches to ending the escalating cycle of craving, satisfaction, deeper craving that is creating far too many addicts and far too many opioid related deaths.

That there are indeed, present day messiahs roaming our planet preaching their own unique version of the meaning of life, the way to happiness, and the path to God.

I have also been thinking a lot lately.

That statues and monuments are merely symbols of our history, and that removing them won't matter one bit if we don't address the underlying cause which leads everyday people to hate other people because of a more pronounced degree of sun exposure.

That words matter more than symbols, and that when we do not condemn a mind set that places one race above another, or advocates the kind of hate that drove the everyday people of Germany to excuse, at best, condone and contribute to, at worst, one of the most heinous programs of genocide in our history, we are likely to repeat such terrible actions.

That while we debate about lowering the tax on corporations that demonstrate limited loyalty to America, choosing to move jobs, monies, and home offices to wherever they get the best deal, most inner cities schools are struggling to make payroll and provide basic teaching tools, producing children, who will have learned that rich people are more important than our youth.

That work ethic seems to be on the decline while drug dependency is on the rise.  If we assume that we engage in activities that produce pleasure, thereby training our brains to seek those activities, and given that the last 35 years has produced a minimum increase in the standard of living of most Americans as compared to a hundred fold for the wealthy, then perhaps it is no wonder that too many everyday people are reluctant to buy into the version of the American dream that depicts a relaxed retirement after a lifetime of hard work.

And, if the above continues, that more and more people will look to the lottery as the only way to financial independence, or worse, find contentment in the arms of the plethora of drugs, legal and illegal, that produce far too many addled brains, as well as too many rich pharmaceutical CEO's.

That the internet provides the world at our fingertips, all knowledge, all facts, all of history, but is too often used as a distraction from living, or as a way to spread falsehoods and distortions so as to gain power and money.  And that our phones have evolved from a lump of black plastic and metal that was more useful as a paperweight than a communication device, to a hand held wonder that takes better pictures than most cameras, and enables us to find out virtually anything we need to know, from directions to a list of the tallest trees, but is unfortunately mostly used to send pictures of cute animals, outrageous comments that have been taken out of context, and viral emails that depict the everyday activities of our lives as the greatest, the best, or the worst, as if the preceding thousands of years of mankind's existence had little meaning.

That perhaps if our political and religious leaders worried less about their personal legacies (and wallets) and more about the ability of everyday people to be happy, productive, and inspired that anything is possible with perseverance, then we might be able to create a world where the basic needs of indoor plumbing and accessible, potable water, a safe and solid education, and the guarantee that hard work, regardless of occupation will result in access to affordable health insurance and health care, will come before billion dollar sporting arenas and trillion dollar weapons systems.