Thank You

Heartfelt thanks for the replies to my first post from Harmonie (Maurice), Zelmayer (Jbell), and Melby (Antwerpen)!!  I read your posts eagerly and with much interest. 

Tonight, as usual, I am alone in my apartment here in the U.S. with my female Siamese cat named Hope (really).  Man is a social animal, I have read many, many times.  Well, practically speaking, I am an exception to that rule (?).  Marriage as well as any significant number of especially single female companions and/or friends has eluded me.  Solitude has been my sole guide and enough loneliness to make me hate life and all human-beings at times, has been my most constant companion.

Some of you might get the impression that I am an extreme introvert and always locked into my own head in deep and troubling thought.  This would only be partially, true, though.  What is a mystery to me is that young children and animals flock to me almost without fail.  Don't know why, really, but they do.  The speed at which they do so, upon my first encounter with them, is pretty amazing to the few people who become my good friends.  What is my usual response?  I just shrug my shoulders and say "I don't know."

The reality is that I DO know how to be extremely interesting, intelligent, and gracious or pleasant company.  A main reason why, in my opinion, is that I am normally socially aggressive at this point in my life.  What goes through my head most of the time is "Why not be outspoken and brutally honest?  Time has grown quite short for me and I have ALWAYS despised people who are vain and arrogant with a passion!"

The United States, today, is exactly where it should be.  My country has the most expensive and inefficient health care system in the world.  It is one of the, if not the major drug-addicted nation in the world.  Our students in our "higher education" system have been dumbed down to the point of sheer idiocy.    Overall, corporate greed and political corruption have sold our country out to the highest bidders and the final curtain has fell.  Unfortunately, as citizens, we have had our head in the sand for so long and believed our own unadulterated bullshit for so long, that the train wreck has happened and a once-great country lies in ruins.  America is not just a nation/society of strangers, any more.  We are in a critically ill state of self-delusion, not just self-denial.  And why not??  After all, it's everybody else's fault we constantly cry and moan.  A sorry spectacle.  No, more like a rotten, pathetic disgrace.

Enough of that for now and maybe for any future posts.  When people accuse me of being an impossible pessimist or fatalist, I vehemently disagree and tell them I am a pragmatist and realist at heart.  It's funny.  So many people in my life have told me they treasure honesty in their relationships.  Yet, when I give them just that, they bristle in anger and indignation.  Too bad.  I'm so tired of immature and almost infantile adults who want their cake and to eat it, too.

Good grief, I'm trying to put a halt to my dark mood now.  The pressure inside my head and heart are too great, though.  I'll have to stop, any way.

Fall in the state I'm living in hasn't been too bad this year.  Winter can be very cold and snowy.  Spring is my favorite season of the year by far.  Summer is second and winter is definitely dead last.

As long as the weather outside permits, I ride my bike.  It is great exercise and I love it.  When I remember to, I also truly love taking pictures.  Aside from the lack of any human company, I would actually make the case for being a well-rounded person.  My interests are many and diverse.

Almost time to close.  Tired, but not sleepy.  So strange and hostile a world I think we all inhabit today.  Where has basic human dignity, common sense, and manners gone?  A "civilized world we live in?  Maybe, but just maybe in my opinion. 

Enough.  Best wishes to all and I hope life goes well for all of you. 

Craig