Friday, October 17, 2008

Personal happiness vs world events

Maybe I've hit a string of luck lately, or I really enjoyed my recent vacation, or maybe some recent events keep reiterating that life is short, or maybe I've been getting just enough exercise to keep the endorphins pumping...   Maybe the 40 hour/week gig isn't putting mood altering stress on me at the moment...

Whatever the explanation, despite news of economic turmoil, a plumetting DJIA, and a high-stakes election hanging in the blanance, my mental state has been very positive lately.  Feels like I've got an excess of love to give.   I love my family, friends, cat, software, basketball, nature, teaching, and many other things.

Have to classify it as a love of life in general.

Really only have 2 major concerns at the monent...    cleaning my condo and making it into a sweet place to live & a bit of concern over the election.  In the grand scheme of things, a little cleaning isn't very major and Obama gives me hope that the US can correct course and stop abusing it's "lone superpower" status for a bit.  With any luck we can make a return toward role model status in international relations.  Granted, we've never been perfect, but I'm old enough to remember a time when rumors of the US pre-emptively invading a soverign nation (such as Iran or North Korea) would have been laughable.  I strongly believe that such actions are the equivalent to mortgaging our future for short term "wins".

In fact if I was a terrorist circa 2000 bent on the seemingly impossible task of the destruction of the US, dragging the nearly unchallenged leader of the world down to the level of an international thug would be the first order of business.  I was convinced for years that didn't make any sense for a motivation to attack the World Trade Center; however, the events of the past 7 years have played out much differently than I would have predicted.

I'm sure to a supporter of the Bush administration, this sentiment sounds blasphemous or at least anti-patriotic...    Perhaps a well known allegory has the best chance of getting the point across - and I'll present it in the form of a question from a galaxy far far away:

What would the Rebels in Star Wars (Leia, Luke, Han, etc) be if the Empire was merely a successful economic power who promoted human rights, a fight against starvation on the poorest planets, and whose most threatening "weapon" was economic sanctions?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Im glad you're happy! That makes me happy too!

Anonymous said...

I would think that you would be more motivated at work and getting more things done since you've been exercising more. But no.. Its the opposite. LOL. Das funny but as long as you are happy it's all good!!

Anonymous said...

Han – drug dealer/porn star
Chewy – mall security guard
Leia – talk show host
Luke – game store employee
R2 – bartender
C3PO – Butler
Yoda – Disney actor
and my personal favorite, Porkins – pork rind enthusiast and cookbook author.

- miss