Conrad Memories from the Future

Solitude has been posed as a solution to oh-so-much insanity in our lives.  After all, Sartre in his play No Exit concluded that "Hell is other people."  In his play, a poor guy dies to find himself in a beautifully appointed room with everything you could want and he shares it with two gorgeous women!  He at first thinks that he has obviously gone to Heaven and at first it seemed so.  They make love and enjoy one another's company enormously. Then, he finds he can't actually leave the room and neither can they.  Worse, he finds that he can't even close his eyes, let alone sleep.  Now the terror starts, when he realizes that this is his situation for eternity, never to be alone again, never to have solitude. So, what is it that makes it so bad?  Well, solitude is when a person can settle and listen to their own inner voice.  Even the quiet of perfect meditation is an inner listening of sorts not possible in a truly shared environment.  For w...

I did not believe how easily the Republican establishment, people who had been in Washington for a long time and had professed a belief in certain institutional values and norms, would just cave. You think about John McCain: For all my differences with him, you would not have seen John McCain excuse a president cozying up to Vladimir Putin, or preferring Russian interpretations of events over those of his own intelligence agencies. And to see figures in the Republican Party do a complete 180 on everything they claimed to believe previously is troubling.  -- Barack Obama True democracies, modern or not, don't fail.  I know that sounds extreme and a bit insane, but here is my reason for believing it.  Democracies don't fail, but the people in a democracy can.  America is right on the edge of seeing whether we will fail or not. Our democracy has been wrapped in too much myth and hasn't been seen as clearly as it should be.  We have heroes of our democracy and that ...

It's a cold Saturday morning, January, 1960 and it's time for the battle. Dinner won't be for another couple of hours and we have the fort ready.  Took three of us to get the snow packed right and we can't wait to try it out.  We even have the snowballs ready made and stacked.  Snow on the ground three feet deep.  You'd think we were in the mountains!  Other than having to shovel the path to the outhouse, this winter has been perfect. Of course there have to be rules.  No snowballs packed around clods and rocks!  No BB guns!  No breaking off icicles and using them as clubs or spears!  No knocking down the walls of the fort, because we don't want to have to build it again.  Next week, we swap out the guys who get to use the fort. Some of these guys have no sense if you don't set this out ahead of time. The above is a real scene from the best snowfall winter of my lifetime in Manchester, Kansas.  It was my last winter in my beloved to...

  Dear Santa, This year, I don't need or want any toys.  I know it sounds corny, but I kind of want peace around the world more than toys, I hope that is OK.  I have a list in order that I am hoping you can bring me for the next year: A return to health for my daughter.  I think that is all she will need, she will do the rest. A government that helps Americans and other people in the world.  I think we are about to get a new President, but, if we don't, you may as well just forget the rest of these wishes. A return to efforts to mitigate climate change.  The sooner you can get that here, the better. Peace with justice for people.  And give an extra helping to oppressed people.  You know who they are. Feed poor people and get health care for them.  While you are at it, see if you can bring a little understanding of their needs to rich people. A new vaccine for Covid-19 that works.  And could you bring a little wisdom for the people who do...