You know, you read stuff like Bukowski and you see the lack of fulfillment from hedonistic endeavors not too dissimilar from those engaged in by such a tremendous alcoholic as Charles. And yet, there is some sense of romanticism about the life of the barfly. However, I have realized that we all love to idolize everything that we are not, but aspire to be. That or what we draw our inspirations from. The well is deep, but the font is dry.

I don’t claim to know what a sense of fulfillment, meaning, or purpose really is, but I think these are what we proclaim to the trees from the hilltops when our hunger goes unsatisfied and we desire more than we have. We are filthy animals with poor priorities. We recognize our slavers, but we are afraid to rebel.

“Wouldn’t it be nice?” they say. But it’s not life.

“But it could be life…and that is the key that everyone refuses to admit!”

Life is strife. Science our bane, now that god has died. The war machine lurches ever forward, its hunger never ceasing as it feeds upon our bigotry and greed. The rich maintain their serenity. The poor suffer effortlessly with their belief that the disparity, which never ceases to increase, is somehow an improvement on the way that things used to be. Foreign youth cry for democracy as our troops shoot them down. Are they not fulfilled by the equality we bring? Black, white, male, female, mother, daughter, father, son, young and old, all races, all genders, all quantifiers and labels, equally privileged to die by our hands!

“Oh no!” they cry.

“This cannot be what we believed!

“This is certainly not what we meant to say or to see!

“No, no, no! This cannot be…”

“The dream we hoped to free!”