I.

In these days of quarantine, worry, mixed information and lack thereof, there is a ray of hope, there must always be a ray of hope.  And there is, not to sound cynical.

As the toilet paper disappears and masked misanthropes wander, there seems to be newly found wonder in the world.  The machine seems to be idle, for once.

As those typical old rants of economic restraint and essentiality fill the airwaves and our ears we seem to feel the faint breeze of comfort and slowness.

Let the motor madness idle.  Let us take a long look at what we’ve built, and let us question, for once, what we are told.  Let us redefine rule and turn our backs on the delusion of the possession of progress by those who would turn the screws even tighter.

We can all learn from a virus, but not from history? We must, however, learn from history and accept Camus’ Plague for what it is: a little lesson of human humility.

II.

Corona is defined as a crown, the prince, the leader, and the many are told to accept the monarch as our own, but acceptance must be prefaced by prise.  There is no honor in the crown of a buffoon King that escapes definition.

Tolerance for the inevitable is necessary, but forbearance for foolishness is never to be acknowledged.

We must protect ourselves from corona, from the crown’s crimes that would have us bow before it.  We must tolerate our detachment, but not the cold-hearted clowns that paint the ugly smiles that stare at us through the windows.

Detached but not separated must be the way, even through the dark deluge of dishonesty that the crown brings to the king corona, to the decency of people everywhere that simply want a chance to live peacefully among the jackals who wear leopard robes of treachery.

The room is getting small, but I don’t care.  My eyes are wider, I think to myself as the walls move ever closer.  The bottle seems empty although the screw top is securely fastened and the liquor is level with the neck.  I’m nervous.

Soon this has got to be over but it’s only been six days.  Six days of being told no by people who don’t know.  Six days of toilet paper and invisible demons, zombies walking the streets afraid of the very brains they eat.  Six days of Mitch and the boys blurting out shit-stained sentences about nothing that no one cares about.

It doesn’t help that I don’t care.  It doesn’t help that my mind is a blur with thoughts of the apocalypse.  The end of the world is a welcome change from this tedium.  I’ll need to remember my machete, just in case.

I’ll go for a bike ride.  It’s safe in my helmet.

Beer is running low, but there’s three pounds of coffee in the freezer.  I’ll have to make run.  I’ll dig a grave for my sanity on the way out.  Oh, never mind, there isn’t time.

No matter the guise; no matter the government; no matter the cause: I am there.  I am there with my smile and my promises; and you listen as I talk.  I talk and continue to speak as the blood runs from your ears and tears role from your eyes.  I will speak.

The words will float at first, and then as the heaviness begins to sink in they will turn to stones.  They will burn your skin, but you will cease to not believe.  They will burrow like a tick; they will crawl with unrelenting fervor and as they eat away at all hope: I will speak.

My eyes look at nothing; my mind thinks no thoughts;  I am empty and that is my strength: the void that was my humanity was given away long ago.  My suit is clean and my hands are dirty.  My shoes are polished as I step over the remnants of my integrity and all of our possibilities.

My law is my master; my words are my weapons. I have a heart of gold.

There is danger in every crevice, in every corner, and I feel it in my bones.  Security is my goal, the ever-allusive safety that I am promised by those that would keep me safe.  I will pay the cost, not because I must, but because the darkness of ignorance suits me.

I need a weapon; I need a camera;  I need to know that the weapons of evil or quelled by the lights of heaven.  I need to know that all is well as I sit in my room alone with my fears.  Change must be ceased; progress must be stifled; smiles must be turned.

As age creeps up, as all things do, with a menace in its eyes and evil in its heart, my right is safety and my liberty is an illusion.  Death, the ultimate enemy, must not win and just as security against the devils of the world must be strengthened so must the security against the abyss that I imagine.

I will pay the price, and will force you to do the same.

Within the books of philosophy are the secrets of all knowledge and wisdom that make us human.  I know that they are ignored for the fanfare of glitter and shiny toys and yet I persist.  Some call it a waste of time and energy but I must learn to smile and crack a joke at my own expense or be taken as arrogant.

I revel in science, but am not a scientist.  The analytical is paramount, but I am not a business man.  I follow words as if they are a rare and beautiful animal but am not a poet; logic not literature.

With the shadows dancing on the walls I point out the wooden puppets and yet I am the fool; I will accept this, but only with time.  I must find warmth in loneliness and comfort in the dark fortitude of Truth.

The ideas dance in my head, connected so clearly by the logic that bounds us all.  The ideas are clear but the terms are vague and misunderstood; misused, philosophy is a weapon of enormous magnitude and dismissed as a toy by most.

I am that person that sits silently in a corner, perhaps a glass of scotch in one hand and a book in another.  I have given up on the world of society and it on me.  But that is OK, only because it has been so for thousands of years.

I have sold my soul, it is true, but I did get a good price.  I will sell it again at a profit.  I will sell yours if you let me (you will, you know); I can guarantee a good price for such a clean item.  Everything can be for sale, you must know this by now.

And if it is not for sale, well, then it is worthless because it is worthless to me.  I have no qualms because I have no imagination. I will admit that, but I do have a talent for seeking out the stench of money.  After all, it is only business.

Progress is profit and product must move; this is a universal law.  I can make sure that you can afford it; that is not a problem.  I can’t afford bowing to the virtues of morality, but I can afford buy them.

I am the buyer and seller; I am the deceiver and the saint.  I make laws to sell them and break them for profit.  It is not for the good that I do this, I am not a giver of necessities; I sell liberty and justice.  I am the bottomless pit of greed and economic gravitas.

The price is too high; the cost is too great, but only for you.  I will sell until the end of time and then I shall sell that too.

With my words I will change the world; their sounds wafting through the universe.

The forgotten artist, the academic bard.

Simplify sentences; state the truth.

Pen to paper.

Thoughts.

There is a place that I have not seen, a place that I have not been.  There is always another mountain, another road.  The backpack collects no dust and the tent never sits unfolded.  The car is a tool, the motorcycle is better, the place: outside of the typical.

Curiosity never killed the cat, but it has changed the life of all adventurists.

Too many hours within one zip code, or perhaps it is simply the horizon the beckons?  It is genetics, this curiosity, the drive to change, for change is (after all) the only consistent.  But as ironic as it may seem, it is the consistency that matters.

Do not make the mistake of believing in your dreams; adventures do not have consistent conclusions, foreseen consequences.  The adventurist will learn this…sooner or later.  This is part of the adventure no matter what your belief is about the trip.

The platitude for the adventurist to remember: everything has a cost and a benefit, but don’t be so sure you know which is which.  Enjoy the adventure and pay for it with your past.  The sun will set and where will you be?  This is the question in the back of every adventurist’s mind.