Karma

Needs have been (for the most part) met. Coffee, a steaming plate of Hunan Pork, nicotine. A little sleepy, though. Waiting for the Muse to descend.

Start with a thought, let the words flow form there. Happy little words. They're your words. Do what you want with them. Give them free reign. Rope them in when they get too sure of themselves, too carried away. They have a habit of doing that, like teenagers the first time the parents leave them home alone for the night.

A travel advertisement? Bloomington, Indiana is located in the south-central part of the state. Rolling hills and virgin forests of pine and hardwoods. They say this is were the glaciers ended their march during the last ice age, the reason for the hills. Stopped and retreated. Bloomington is a culturally diverse city, due to the size and prestige of Indiana University. You can eat foods from around the globe, and meet people of several different nationalities. There is even a Tibetan monastery here, and several members of the Dali Lama's family. The Dali Lama himself has been here many times. I cooked for him twice. Bloomington also has a drug and homeless problem that would be outrageous in a city twice the size. Sometimes I feel lucky to be here, but mostly I hate it.

Diminishing returns on your social investments. You feel like you give to humanity, not financially, but socially, and the payoffs get smaller and smaller.You hold doors for people. You wave when they stop to let you cross the street. You say please and thank you, and even God bless you, though you have no idea what you mean by it. People don't care. They take, want more, don't give anything in return. You set yourself up by doing the things you think everyone should do, that constitute good manners, and expecting the same in turn. People in cars cut in front of you while making a turn at the light, making you stop and wait, even thought it is twenty degrees out and you are walking and they are in a warm car. Is it your fault they are late? Is it your fault they hit snooze ten fucking times before getting out of bed? No. But they will blame you if they are fourteen seconds more late, like it matters when added to the twenty minutes they have already made themselves late. They will focus on those seconds.

So you are unsatisfied with the returns and you start investing less in society. You stop doing all the little things. What happens then? There are people out there who are appreciative of the little gestures that make up polite society, and when you let those who don't influence how you treat everyone, you are creating a chain which has no end. A chain of misery and ill feelings. And the links start to get bigger. They connect with even bigger links. Before you know it, letting a door slam in someone's face turns into someone being murdered on the other side of the planet. You start someone's bad day, and they affect the next person, who affects the next person, and on and on and on and on and on and on and on......................

Maybe it is Karma? Could it be that the people who are rude to you are doing it because you deserve it for some past deed? My problem with Karma is that the wrongs done to you don't just affect you. They cause you to mistreat others, who mistreat others. There would have to be a cosmic supercomputer placing all the links in the right spots, so that all the right people would be punished. What would be the sense of punishment, then? If everyone is just acting out their part, filling their role, like Judas, what would be the meaning of life? People being punished for punishing people, and having no say in it. This is the problem I have with the way the church treats the memory Judas Iscariot. If he was just playing out a necessary role in a predetermined, vital plan, why all the bad mouthing? He should have gotten a sainthood. If Karma does exist, I hope someone is keeping a close watch so it doesn't get off track.

Could it be possible that we are all just cogs in a doomsday machine, which will run until it finally goes out of control and explodes, taking us all into the cosmos with it?

I doubt it. But if we are, we could always try to buck the system, refuse to mistreat each other, and reverse the timer on the machine.

I doubt that would happen, either. Unfortunately.

The idea that we are doomed seems more likely to me.

Bored with this topic. Time to change gears. Pick another topic.

I have witnessed a lot of racist chatter lately. Most of it seems to stem from the incident in Missouri. I saw a post by someone who used the word monkey several times when talking about it, and championing the police. This guy also has several police glorifying posts on his page. I actually thought he was a cop when I first saw it, then I found out he had done time in the Federal Penitentiary. I don't understand this. I don't like cops. I don't go for the old, "just doing their job" thing. The police are tools of oppression, and everyone knows that, so if you willing accept that job you must be fine with the fact that you will be oppressing people. How can you  relish the death of someone you have never met, especially at the hands of the people who would easily do the same to you? I can't wrap my head around it. You are doing exactly what the Powers That Be want you to do. They don't want the people in this country to get along, especially the people who have no money. If people did that, they might start getting ideas. They might get together and realize they are all being played and taken for a ride. The rich and powerful don't see race as an issue. All they see is money and power. The struggle in this country is not about race. The struggle in this country is a class struggle, ans when you fall into racism you are doing what the government wants you to do. The same thing goes for abortion and gay rights and religion. The politicians, mostly the Republicans, couldn't give two shits about any of these issues. They use them as a smokescreen to drum up support and votes. This is a fact: The most under-educated, most homophobic, most hate filled, most republican states are also the most religious. People are pawns. They continue to let their ignorance, fears, and insecurities be used against them. The political parties sit back and laugh at how stupid we all are, how we can't even put petty differences aside to try and better our situation.

Got off track there at the end, but that is something that has been on my mind.