Well, now that I am eighty, years old that is, I am wondering just how precious life is.
In my earlier years it had much more to offer.   Now I can see the future better and it is not such a good vision.   I will face it as it come probably; that is what I have always done.   However it occurs to me more often now that life is not the only game in town.  The other option is growing in my admiration.   To be or not to be,  I wonder, will I know when it is time to not to be.  For now with ample beer I can live with myself and my memories.

Many of my memories are quite lovely and I have created many special things and done what I considered my best in my family and professional life and I am proud.  Yet there is another side and I find that valuable that as well.

It is generally considered that we aught ignore past assaults and slurs.   Now I find that I am not so sure of that advice as I enjoy so much now my darker side.   I expect we have all suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.   (Hey, that is good.  Just remember you read it here first.)   Anyway to ignore insults and outrages is to let yourself be vulnerable to more of them.   I do not then subscribe to the forgive and forget policy.   I say notice,  remember and beware.   For me retribution is not needed and futile.  What we need is  revision.  I only want to recall and be on guard.  Not all people are our friends.  Many will climb our backs needlessly for their gain.  I know that in the end we are all competitors for survival as is any animal.  Yet there is plenty of room for mutual gain and cooperation.   Those are under utilized.

Religion has done the most needless damage in this arena.   Yet, religion is man made and we are to blame for its abuses.   All the value that religion can offer in terms of group cooperation can be had without the absurdities of its encrusted folly and vileness.   Examples abound but consider the jewish and christian and muslim cults.   They remain to this day devoted to the most egregious nonsense of  their 'holy' books and they basically hate each other. Clear instructions from their gods call for murder, rape, pilage, slavery and so on.   Religious people have the power to grasp vulnerable others into  their changeless, toxic ways.   But it isn't religion it is us.  We who do not help eradicate it are guilty of it.


So as I reflect on my own life and recognize the lies and heavy burden of religion on the society about me I am BITTER.   And I don't apologize for it.  If you are not bitter as well, you are the problem as I see it.