Life is a remarkable experience.
We humans have been on this Earth for countless ages now, and we're nowhere closer to fully understanding "life" than we were back in the days of Socrates, Plato, etc. If anything, we're not even up to their level...a devolution, if you will, in thought...understanding...really seeing what is in front of us.

Socrates knew it. And it's so simple. Life is about internal growth...improving oneself...screw material possessions ie money. Focus on the importance of good relationships, friendship, nourishing each other...becoming a true community...all of that fluff...The truth is below the shadows of existence, not right in our faces, or on the faces on our dollar bills. But I suppose most folks back then were a lot like us...unwilling to part with the desire to have multiple houses, multiple cars, a fat savings account...continue living life in total ignorance just as soon as the voice of reason is silenced.

But, being the bad ass cowboy that he was, Socrates bit the bullet and rode off into the sunset with dignity, opting to face the firing squad rather than escape and live the rest of his days in hiding. Alot like Jesus really.

Bill Hicks, during one (probably during many) of his stand-up acts, made a comment concerning the fact that we somehow need to kill the revolutionary minds, and this seems to be especially true concerning the United States. MLK Jr., Kennedy, hell, John Lennon comes over here and we kill him.

Are we just so involved in the status quo, fearing change/revolution that we have to destroy anything that threatens this shaky existence? What if this isn't "it"?

I'm certain that this isn't "it". Life cannot be about everything I do and think about day after day...for years...

At some moments, I allow time, space, existence to pass over me. Instead of swimming along in the current, I stop flapping my arms and moving my legs. I drift for a second, then extend my legs and allow my toes to touch the floor. The waters pound my back, spitting mist over my shoulder. The longer I avoid the tide, the stronger it becomes, forcing me to bend...forcing my mind to bend...to question...

Am I just a pair of ears and eyes...looking down my nose...gathering visual and audio information...Veins...brain...blood?
What is that voice in my head? Why does it tell me to "think"? Why does it tell me to love, and not to hate? Why doesn't it tell me to just accept the way things are? Would I really be able to live in such a world if I truly did hear the cries of pain?

I punch away at a thousand dollar keyboard while children beg to God for food. I care, yet I feel ultimately powerless, and honestly I am.

What skill do I possess that could help my fellow man? I'm a terrible beggar, and refuse to ask others like myself for their food, shelter, etc. What good is taking away the little that we (I) have while the callous, seemingly uncaring millionaires sacrifice nothing, yet take and take and take, even going so far as to complain when they take slightly less?

Our system needs a complete overhaul.

Bill Hicks had some good ideas. Shame he was merely a jester and died too young, leaving us all in this mess with his limited amount of material. Perhaps his ghost or spirit could send us some more bits?

Probably the most profound (yes, he made some profound statements all the while making dick and fart jokes) statement he made concerned humanity, specifically, the humanity in the United States. I'm not holding the common man at fault. He (We) are pretty powerless unless a revolution on a major scale occurs, but he mentioned something about how our nation allows all this money and manpower to be spent on building machines for war, while, if we used the same resources in a more constructive way, we could feed and clothe the rest of the starving, naked world many times over.

Fuck it, can we all just start over? Is it too late to apologize for eating off that damn Tree of Knowledge?