The Latest & Greatest For This Year, Anyway) Of The Sunsets I've Seen

Mundus Nunc Non Modo Discissus Est, Semper Discissus Est

    Another day, another conversation with someone who thinks we live in the worst possible time to be alive. 

   Which, as all who really know me know, is something I just cannot tolerate.

  This conversation was a tad different however, in that the person I was having the conversation with was quite a bit older than one of the usual suspects. This person was more my age, not some fresh-faced, inexperienced and undereducated mid-twenties snipe.

   It was a little disheartening to me because of that fact. I keep holding out for people of my age group to grasp the fact that every era, no matter how you want to define it (a millennium is probably too broad a range, but maybe fifty years? Twenty years? Ten years?) has had it's injustices, it's failures, it's righteousness, it's successes, it's own particular twist on what is moral or immoral, it's wealth or resources gap, it's detractors and it's supporters...I could go on, but I trust you get the gist.

   This person just flat out refused to accept anything I had to say when I began to counter his statements with what I thought were extremely polite and well-thought out rebuttals.  

   I mean, in light of the fact that I was interpreting what he was saying as the half-mad ravings of a disaffected lunatic.

   It's getting tiresome listening to people tell me (usually in a very aggressive manner) that we are living in the end times, that the world is going to hell in a hand basket (especially the good ol' U.S. of A), and it's really aggravating when I'm treated as a lessor person for not accepting that spiel without dissent.

   But dissent I must, for we live in a time when the history of the world, the entire history of the world, is literally available at almost everyone's fingertips, and for anyone with access to that knowledge to consider that being alive today is worse than it was ten years or twenty years or fifty years or even a millennium ago..well, that just belies a person's claim to be knowledgeable about facts and reveals their lack of perspective or experience.  

   For, as the title of this post clearly states, the world isn't just now falling apart, it's always been falling apart.

Calling It As I Experienced It

 The woman was a stranger to me, yet she spoke to me as if we had been friends for ages. The conversation was just a tad one-sided though, as she barely stopped talking to catch her breath, much less allow me to add to the convo.

   Apparently the person she thought I was must have been a great listener - she never asked a question that needed an answer, speaking as if the story she was weaving needed no explanation, and even if it did she was not inclined to offer any.

   Suddenly the conversation came to an abrupt stop. Well, she stopped speaking abruptly, that is. 

   She didn't say a word for at least thirty full seconds, and then she asked, "Have you ever dated someone for just one day? I mean, have you ever had someone ask you if you and they could start dating each other all serious like, and then just a few hours later, on the same day, that same person told you the relationship was over? Just, you know, all out of the blue like?"

   Her pause was followed by an expectant look, so I replied, that yes, yes I had.

   She then asked me to elaborate.

   So I said, with what I thought was a genial, semi-joking inflection in my voice, that I had started serious relationships with a few women in the evening that started out great, got even better after a few hours, but then were completely over when the sun came up.

   She looked at me both hard and repulsed, then quipped, "You think you're funny, don't you? Hmmphh."

   I didn't offer a word of argument, as I did, indeed, think I was funny.

The Somewhat Creative Fence In Colorado Springs

 

Completely Free Of FOMO

   He said he no longer had any idea what was going on. He was out of touch with everything - couldn't name any popular songs, hadn't been in a movie theater since 2020, didn't know which television shows were considered must see or what, if any, new books were considered the latest must reads.

   After a bit more elaboration on what he hadn't been able to keep up with in the past five years or so he paused for a minute before stating, "Truth be told, I really don't care about any of those things anymore, none of it actually matters, and I believe I'm happier now that I've made that realization than I've ever been."

Angry, Whiney People

I know people who complain...alot

They go on and on, they never stop

Like a malcontented, angry atomic clock

They're only happy when they complain

Compelled to even treat sunsets with disdain

It's enough to give the Dalai Lama a migraine

Can't understand what they are going on about

Why they're so mad, why they scream and shout

Is it some anti-Alderian rejection of self-doubt?

The Great & Beloved Ninja Larry, 2009 - 2015

    A little more than 15 years ago my oldest sister brought me a cat. A kitten, actually, a small black kitten.

   The kitten had been one of a litter that was born in a barn on a farm just south of La Junta, and apparently my sister knew the farmers and also, apparently, my sister felt strongly that I needed this kitten.

   See, the previous cat that had shared my home, Moe, had passed away a few months before, and, well, I've always had cats and dogs living together, except not at that time.

   At that time it was just Cami the Britney Spaniel, and truth be told, the house needed a cat.

   You know, for balance.

   It took a few days for Cami to get used to the kitten, and vice versa, but eventually they became friends.

   If I recall, they became friends before a name was even bestowed upon the kitten. That name of course was Ninja Larry.

   Not a lot of thought was put into the name, it's just the little kitten was stealthy and wrapped in black, and kinda looked like a "Larry".

   Ninja Larry grew up and got big, all the while being friendly to almost everyone he met, unless they were a mouse, or a rabbit, or a slow bird, or even a garter snake. 

   Eventually, he got real big, over twenty pounds, and he developed some serious skills and abilities. Not only could he climb up and down trees, he could also jump up on the roof (at the low eave, near the porch), and he could jump down from the roof (same location).

   He also became quite the neighborly cat, walking down the street and into neighbors garages and homes, just as carefree as can be. My neighborhood is one in which most everyone knows everyone, and everyone got to know and love Larry.

   At our neighborhood gatherings, it was not unusual for Ninja Larry to be greeted far more enthusiastically than I ever was.

   Ninja Larry was, like the cat he succeeded, the sort of cat that people who claimed not to like cats would say, "But I like this cat, this cat is cool."

   Larry was cool, and friendly, and affectionate, and fearless, and an excellent mouser, just about everything one could desire in a cat.

   And now Larry has passed into the great beyond and I will miss him.