People are Strange

It's Saturday afternoon and I am riding along a usual route.  There is no traffic so I am admiring some of the gardens and landscaping of the houses along the way. This is a typical eastside neighbourhood street--about half the houses are 60's style smaller bungalows. The other half of the properties have houses that have replaced the older smaller ones with much larger and grandiose. All are landscaped within an inch of their lives.

As I am riding by, I see a woman who has obviously just spent the afternoon engaged in the maintenance of that most curious of bourgeois affectations--the lawn.  I can see that it has been freshly mown, I can smell the cut grass. As a typical suburban conformist, she stands and admires her fruitless work.

At the moment I am approaching, she notices a piece of paper that the wind has carried onto the edge of her lawn. She swiftly marches over to seize the offending candy bar wrapper. She bends down to pick it up and I expect her to turn towards the house, the garage where I see trash cans awaiting. However, she turns instead towards the street and deliberately, carefully, almost reverentially, places the flotsam into the street.

I see this happening in about three seconds it takes me to roll by. I am astounded.

I am left wondering how a person who obviously takes pride in yard maintenance and should have some awareness of the natural world would be so blithe. Is it a matter of a fortress/island mentality--once the offense is off my property it's of no more concern? Is it a matter of  the wrapper being another daily annoyance and affront to her own sense of  my/mine, some sort of material tresspass? Is it simple laziness and the path of least effort?

I'll never understand people.

Three Days

The Long Weekend: three days where people think they would be happier if only they were somewhere else.

Tell me why

                   Why is it that if I am crazy enough to take a large and powerful weapon out of my house, travel for a short while and then begin to target individuals out enjoying their day; peaceable law-abiding people causing no harm to no one, if I should target guys wearing hats, or kids playing basketball or any random assortment of people engaged in a mutual activity like walking down the street or riding bicycles, if I should maliciously and willfully try to cause grievous injury or death--why is it that the consequences of this certifiably insane act of mayhem should be weighed in the balance of my choice of weapon?

Now to create mayhem without consequence, the choice of weapon is one to be pondered before a hasty decision is reached. Maximum effectiveness might be realized through the use of an M1A1, a highly efficient and manoeuvrable killing machine. The trouble is that deniability is hard to  claim as they drag your smoking corpse from the hull of your shattered tank. Besides, those babies are really hard to get a hold of.

No I'll need something more practical, more personal, more American--I need a gun. Not just any gun. I need a big gun. A really big gun....

So now that I got my Mr.Keaton giant earthworm killin' death bringer loaded, one must decide upon a target, say, bicyclists...NO--short people. Yes that's it, short people. They are always getting in front of you when you're walking and because they have small little legs they take short little steps, so they're slow as jam and you're in a damn hurry and why are you so slow??!  They usually wear weird clothes too, a fine enough reason right there.

--But wait.

I must admit that I have been watching a lot of  NCIS on the tube lately and you know them crafty coppers have a million and one ways to tie you to a gun like that. Shoot a bunch of people down and  your options become few--a bullet self administered, die in a hail of police gunfire, or spend the rest of your mortality swapping out brutality, sodomy and boredom.

--There must be a better way. Hmmmm, there must be a better way. Think think think.

--I know. I've got it! I've been overthinking this all along. The answer is sitting right there. Right there in my driveway.

I can get behind the wheel and for the most part can give my attention  to my cell phone, changing the CD, making a grocery list, checking my email, balancing a cup of coffee, burning a cigarette, swattin' the kids--anything and everything expect paying attention to actually driving. This is viewed and is fully accepted as normal and rational behavior.

I can get behind the wheel and injure, maim and kill others, usually with minimal consequence. The word "accident" will be falsely applied to many of my sins, so long as I keep it alcohol free (cuz those Muthas will put a quick end to all the fun) . When the accident excuse fails, it is of little matter, for remember always that it is very rare that you will be labeled as "killer" or "attempted murderer"  because first and foremost you are a "driver", and that supercedes all.

I can kill a man with a gun and receive twenty-five years to life as punishment, kill the same man with my car and, most often, I'll see NO jail time.

Routinely we view a driver's license as a right and not a privilege. Driver's licenses are handed out to wild-eyed sixteen year olds like ritalin is handed out to their little brothers. At the other end of the scale, old men who can barely walk and barely see still motor around in their oversized ancient automobiles, yet it cannot be argued that those whose wisdom has increased are shown to have decreased reaction times. 

All organisms degenerate, all systems will slow to zero. 

How do we acknowledge this fact when it comes to making the tough decision about our very old relatives, within our families and within our societies, about their "right" to drive? We rely on self-assessment, or more often, wait for the inevitable "accident" to happen.