by Ray Jason
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When I need to recharge my “Faith in Humanity” batteries, I sail to a quiet little nearby cove. Then, I sit on deck each morning, happily waiting for a boatload of Innocent Joy to pass by.
It is a small cayuco being rowed by two boys. Also onboard are two sisters who are singing and clapping their hands in time with their songs. They are on their way to school, which is about a mile across the water.
The children live in a modest house on the shore of the lagoon. It was not built by contractors. It was the work of their father and some uncles and some neighbors. Their mom washes their clothes by hand with rain water that they catch from the roof of their house. She dries them in the sun.
They pick fruits, grow vegetables, keep some chickens and catch lots of fish. In other words, they live simply - just as their ancestors did for who knows how many generations.
The tranquility of this idyllic scene helps to heal my troubled spirit after too much time examining the suicidal lunacy of the Modern World.
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About a mile from this anchorage is a little cabin that I think of as Walden South. I believe that Thoreau would be very happy living there in the simple manner that he preferred. His voluntary asceticism, free of the frenzy that occupies most lives, would allow him to leisurely ponder the philosophical subjects that interested him.
I view my fine little ship, AVENTURA, as my sea-going Walden. Visitors tell me that her teak and mahogany interior with bronze portholes and brass lamps, conjure up the image of a bachelor gentleman’s library and study.
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Because I paid her off long ago, my only expenses are food, drink, and miscellaneous. So, I can dedicate myself to research and to wrestling with The Big Topics.
Sadly, those subjects are rarely pleasant. And that is why I periodically have to flee from the Wizard of Wifi and find solace in a cayuco filled with singing children.
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When I think of Thoreau grappling with the great issues of his era, I am wistfully jealous. The problems that he was contemplating were so much less cataclysmic than what confronts us today.
He did not fear Nuclear Annihilation. He did not have to battle Trans-humanists who wish to “evolve” humanity into Cyborgs. He did not lose sleep wondering whether despicable scientists would release a human-made bio-weapon upon the world.
Nor did he worry about deliberate mass migration destabilizing his nation. And he was untroubled by a “Free Press” that was actually defending Power rather than the People. Chemtrails and other forms of Weather Weapons did not trouble his sleep.
The economic time bomb that is the Derivatives Market would not worry him. He would not feel threatened by a Cyber Attack. There would be no well-funded campaign trying to convince him that men can have babies.
As a white, straight male in the 19th Century, Thoreau would not have to worry about being systematically replaced and also being blamed for every evil practice in human history.
However, if he could Time Travel to our current world, he would probably wonder why “food” had been replaced by so many “food products.” And he might question whether “food products” were the reason that so many people were so huge and almost looked like they had been inflated.
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None of these gigantic issues even existed when Thoreau was sitting in his rustic hideaway pondering the world and its problems. But they are inescapable for those of us in the early 21st Century who seek to unravel the Present and perhaps even improve the Future.
In light of all of this, perhaps you can understand why sometimes I have to sheath my cyber-sword, climb down from the societal watchtower … and just sail away.