Less is More

Bach's Ich ruf zu dir Herr Jesu Christ Performed by Dinu Lipatti

TGIF

The basketball was rugged and beautiful.

Elements of speed, explosion, dance and raw emotion tailed away after two hours on a pedestrian Friday. The players exhausted but thoroughly satisfied converged in the locker room for a beer on the 6th floor.

“Good god, you sure were handing it out down in the paint today, Karl,” Mick Collins still wearing his blue scrum jersey shining with sweat spoke with an air of authority and the noise in the room naturally dimmed to a wavering silence.

Rumbles of agreement and congratulations came from the group seated at the two tables in the middle of the locker room. Karl stood up with a hint of quickness not obvious in such a large man. “Mick, I thank you and what can I get you to drink?”

“I’ll have a Bud Light and thank you Karl,” Collins the elder of the group was barely able to register a pat of gratitude on the giant’s back.

“Hey,” what does everyone want to drink?” “Michael?” “Steve?” “Mark?” “Dan?”

“Budlight… Amstel… Heineken… Nothing,” came the replies.

“Dan. You sure we can’t get you anything to drink,” the former offensive tackle spoke in a tone of benevolence and concern reserved for a man the size a flea, but possessing a heart as big as Saturn.

“I don’t deserve it today,” replied the man seated in the sofa next to the tables.

His face was flushed from the workout imposed by the game and he possessed a look of fatigue completely alien to the normal ebb and flow of the health club. Naked except for the workout shorts clinging to his legs, a dark cellphone lay next to him on the couch. Every two or three minutes he would look down upon the phone as if waiting or hoping that some sort of magic would occur.

Disappointed, Karl slowly turned towards the sports shop and ordered the first round of drinks. “Just let us know when you are thirsty Dan,” his voice thundered over the basketball game on the television. “You played great as always.” Faintly in the background the voice of Collins was perceptible, “That Dan is so fast.”

The players of the late pick up game drank until the bells of six o’clock rang and on into the trumpets of seven. The room resembled a recycling plant with the empty beer bottles almost covering the two tables. Stories about combat, wives, kids excelling at school, and growing up in Seattle ended with wave of laughter crashing down the reality of the week and sweeping way any mundane and tiresome thoughts. At three in the afternoon there had been twenty and now there were six enjoying the simple bonds of camaraderie and shared intoxication. And still the man sat perched on the sofa, transfixed by the presence of the phone and protected by five icy, but full cold bottles of Budweiser.

Diplomatically, Karl gently lowered his voice and spoke to the man. “Buddy are you okay?” His concern was genuine as he sipped his beer.

The man looked up with a fear in his eyes as if contemplating the fall from three thousand feet to an ultimate doom. The eyes tired and sad and a complete dichotomy from the inspired bounce and play of the body on the court. The guise was complete after an acrobatic shot from the baseline in the second game and hovering in the air with an illusion to all the normal senses.

“What’s going on Dan?” he almost whispered as if to save his friend from any pending embarrassment.

He looked straight into the man’s eyes on the couch. The alcohol only heightening his persistence and his overall empathy to make everything right in the world.

“I… I’ve lost her,” the man struggled to even mutter the words. Words not meant for basketball and the carnival of Friday afternoons and bordering on sacrilege.

Through his clouded spectacles, it was clearly apparent to Karl that the man was admitting this reality to the world for the first time. In the testosterone circus and whirlwind of noise, there existed a funnel of utter silence for the two men.

“I’m sorry,” the big man ignored the newly spilled beer next to him slowly pouring from the table in a puddle of foam and nodded his head.

“Hey guys!” the voice reverberated around the room and knocked the television into mute.

“Guys!” “Dan's girlfriend finally dumped his sorry ass.”

“Is that why he sucked so badly today,” Collins interjected with a sneer. “Just kidding there Dan,” Collins said with a wink. "I took her out last night."

"How did you screw this one up," proclaimed Mark, the lawyer of the group, his red Stanford shirt wet with beer.

"We were all banking on you getting married and finally losing a step."

The man smiled faintly and nodded towards the group in mock gratitude. For a moment, the room fell to an eerie silence and shock as they had all heard on numerous occasions, how truly wonderful she was.

“Dan, I want to tell you something,” Collins gulped his beer loudly as if to cover the awkward noiselessness.

“After I lost my wife, I moved away to Arizona. I needed the time to heal or whatever.”

“The sun was great in Phoenix, but I felt like I was missing something,” he stopped to look around the room.

“I have played basketball here since 1965, or at least tried to play,” a light laughter filled the room.

“I knew I had to come back to Seattle. This is what I was missing,” Collins looked around to each man and then paused to study the label of his beer.

“Everyone in here has dealt with the pain, loss, confusion, but we have all bounced back.”

“So stick with us and this is what you can look forward to,” Collins heartily smacked his ample belly to a collective cheer and clinking of the bottles.

“Drink up, young man.”

Dan Williamson stumbled smiling and stupid out of the glass front doors of the health club and into the colors and warmth of the bustling crowds and biting December winds of 6th avenue. He was a blank sheet of paper against the quaint sophistication of the vibrant white Christmas lights, softening the trees and buildings. After laboring a few steps to the South, his backpack loosely held in his right hand and swinging against his knee, he reluctantly stopped and gazed back towards the greatest concentration of people. Somewhere within the confines of his mind the fog of loneliness and alcohol extinguished any ideal of hope and the illusion of confidence built on the 6th floor faded with a sudden gust of the wind. For he knew that he had lost the love of his life in the blink of an eye. He walked swiftly up the hill and into the darkness of the South. The headache from the hangover already began to bombard his forehead.

Read of the Week

For those who envision nanotechnology as the tonic to the endgame of the gridlocked lifestyle and the beginning of hovering with the Jetson's, Wil McCarthy's Hacking Matter, exists as the reality between the line of science fiction and technology. McCarthy clearly defines the subtle nuances between the results of successful experimentation in the laboratory and the processes ready for application in private industry.

As programmable matter remains the key buzzword in the minuscule world of the electron, the practical issues that plague the realm of science are apparent in nanotechnology. Though theoretical technology borders on magic, the laws of thermodynamics and Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle compromise the current grasp of technological relevance. Strides continue to be made in ocular technologies and increased memory of processors, however the dreams of a space tower composed of buckytubes or smart nano-bots protecting the body as sentinels against age and disease remain appropriate for the great fictional writers of our time.

Interestingly, McCarthy reveals the current dissension towards capitalism propagated by the fantasy world of the graduate university environment. The average cutting edge PHD possesses no ambition to formulate a standard business model for the industrial use of discoveries made in the laboratory. In a display of pure ideological doublethink with strong hints of socialism, a number of beneficial and marketable technologies are left stuck on hard drives, thanks to an unhealthy ideal towards pure research and data. Not surprisingly, these same individuals receive considerable pieces of the almost 500 million dollar grant pie per year (first approved by Bill Clinton in 2001) allocated by the federal government to the continued research in a nepionic field. The wondrous brand of amiability embraced by academia is at least well funded.


However, McCarthy seems to display a balanced perspective of the general role that tomorrow plays in society.

By profession I'm an engineer, a science fiction writer, and a journalist. All three have in common an obsession towards the future, so extrapolating the scientific trends into future technologies - while imagining and transcribing the results - is both my job and my main amusement.

Family Guys Skit of the Week 2

Foghorn Leghorn and the Egghead Jr. are at the edge of the barnyard engaged in a contest to see who can make it rain. Foghorn is dressed in a Native American rain costume, while Egghead Jr., is building a model airplane.

Foghorn- “Well, I say Boy. This ancient injun dance is sure to bring heavy drops of rain.”

Foghorn performs a rain dance while Egghead Jr. completes his model airplane.

Foghorn- “Just you wait there Boy. It is sure to rain now.”

The sun continues to shine as Egghead Jr. launches his remote controlled plane into the sky. The plane releases a compound of gases which turn into a mini thundering raincloud. Of course the clouds proceeds to float directly over the head of Foghorn and releases its fury in the form of thunder, rain and lightning, drenching and torching the chicken from head to toe.

Foghorn (without the Southern accent): “That’s it! I can’t do this anymore. Egghead Jr., get your little ass over here.”

Egghead Jr. obeys Foghorn.

Foghorn- “I am going to teach you some respect.”

Foghorn throws Egghead Jr. over his leg and gives him a thorough spanking.

Foghorn- “Now, go and find something constructive to do. Missy, get out here.”

Egghead Jr. runs off to play while the spinster hen Missy appears before Foghorn from the hen house.

Foghorn- “I’ve had it. This is the final straw. I have third degree burns all over my body and my ego is completely ruined. Getting lucky with you is not worth dealing with the kid anymore. I’m calling the plastic surgeon like we talked about last week. You are going to become hot.”

Missy is petrified and stands still with her beak wide open.

Foghorn- “And lose those glasses. Haven’t you ever heard of contact lenses. (mutters) Damn single mothers!”

Half of Foghorn’s charred lower beak falls to the ground. Foghorn simply stares at Missy while folding his arms and tapping his leg.

Read of the Week

The younger generations will associate Solaris with the George Clooney remake of the original Russian film. However, it all began somewhere within the confines of Stanislaw Lem's substantial imagination in the form of a novel. At the very base Lem's Solaris encapsulates the wonderment of science fiction, but also delves into the important questions surrounding existence, reality, humanity and god.

Angst

Through the illustrious beats and chirps of the mechanical secretaries and messengers, Sonja James, could still feel the immense heat of the April sun. It was if the festive rivers of colors, shapes and sizes of the forms of people enveloping her in a perfumed tent of vibrancy, did not exist above the analytical melodies of the hand held electronics hidden in pockets, clipped to belts or simply lost and forgotten in the deep grass bordering the turquoise water. This is the sort of havoc the quest for true love caused to a person’s mind and stale heart.

But, it was always April, the Spring gusts of pollen and wine watering the eyes and jostling the taste buds out of an icy winter hibernation. The migration of her inner self had lead her to the coast of Monterrey and the pillars of the ocean waves and the pillars of kelp under the shark infested expansive waters of the Pacific. Through the sea of the crowds and basking tourists on the fog less day, she longed for comfortable chair and a Corona, the sweet and sour of the lemon spray beckoning the depths of the past to dance and float in the coastal breeze.


“What a pretty lady,” the clipped English invaded her ears as she felt the eyes of a group of young men taking pleasure in her fleeting appearance. Inwardly, she smiled as she continued down the boardwalk and tried to detach herself from her work and her life and enjoy the rarity of the vacation. However, the regal lips remained in a state of focus and indifference.


As she passed into the patio of the bar, she felt her purse vibrate and removed her I-phone to see who was attempting to contact her. In the age of constant gossip on the illusion of the global village in first world countries one was never alone. Again all around her, the bells, whistles and electronics shrieks pleaded for the owner’s attention, as the read the email on the small display screen. “Dear Sonja, what are the dems up to now?” The note included a link to an article in the Washington Post and she recognized the sender as her longtime writing partner and somewhat mentor, Jon Locking.


“Ah,” she audibly sighed as looked for an empty umbrella table in the patio.


In the world there was absolutely no means of true escape because of the brilliant dichotomy of portable communications devices coupled with a succinct addiction to being connected. It was absolutely unacceptable to miss any new information or thus feel the guilt and anguish of true disconnect and an unacceptable solitude.


She sat in the patio umbrella and as a majority of yuppies dominated the clean white sidewalk of the boardwalk. Amidst a seasonal rush of pounding feet, wheelchairs and baby carriages, everything remained pristine. The mass of those with disposable income and a floundering presence outside the confines of their 25 mile bubble shined brilliantly in the sunlight. Their ignorant confidence emphasized by the trip meticulous planning in front of the computer on a weekday evening. The use of credit cards and a solid itinerary for the journey to the coast almost as an act for evoking a translucent ability to function as an archaic being.


As she sipped her beer she pondered the way of the world and thought to the vast freeways, the speeding cars impersonal and robotic. The humanity of the inhabitants of the vehicles becoming relative only by a chance meeting at a full stop or in the case of a fender bender. She applied the same treatment to the holiday crowds as the intoxication combined with the rattling of baseball scores and highlights on the bar's televisions from a familiar ESPN announcer flooded the back of her mind.


She sat, staring at middle age through the glasses of a beautifully tall and gracious stance of womanhood. Her blonde hair, highlighted by the sun’s orb of fire could not hide the irrevocable fact of the dissipating years, as the friendly tourists acknowledged her presence with careful nods by the men and the glance of approval from the wives. It occurred in this cylinder of social engineering, tempered by the breeze from the ocean and the pure basking acceptance of living in modern times, that friends and acquaintances were always near. She momentarily blocked out the drone of the performance from the sportscaster to conjure the pageantry of the past and the early 20th century, where ceremony and destiny dominated the very essence of the marathon like celebration of the summer. She thought of the days and nights of simple travel and detachment aboard a tramp steamer across the Atlantic or the rhythmic click and clack aboard the transcontinental railroads, with the mountains gradually painted towards the ceiling of the sky on the canvas of the horizon. The destination was the celebration, as with a relativistic jaunt across the universe once one established contact with solid ground and the concept of there, the tide of reality would eventually roll in during that first night. Up until then, those few precious hours flowed with a mysticism so refined and levitated the person to an existence of dreams, their conscious truly free as they reluctantly awaited the arrival of the real baggage. And now in this hollow future, with the new millennium collecting a pedestrian dust, the rockets did not blare to the moon on a daily schedule, while the planets of the solar system rotated silent and lonely, their orbits observed with care and dreams from the brave few who inhabited the International Space Station hovering gracefully over humanity’s cradle.


“Sonja?” a voice possessing an almost decedent amount of songbird tones with a hint of surprised laughter snapped her attention back to the present.


A couple stood outside the border of her territory near the edge of the boardwalk, the woman in the white hat and sunglasses anxiously waiting for an acknowledgement and the man tall and dark smiling at her pleasantly with an amazing intensity in his eye contact.


“Hey guys,” she projected with excited laughter, “Would you like to join me for a drink.”


It was as if the empty kitchen table save for the piece of bread, was now filled with a healthy banquet of culinary delights. Diana and Bob Kinnig were old friends of hers and recently married. They simply melded into the movements and shapes of the boardwalk.


“This is a pleasant surprise,” she remarked with a beaming smile as the couple settled in at the table. She was taken aback by their appearance, but ecstatic in their presence.


“Bob had some vacation time, my schedule was open and we just decided to wing it,” exclaimed the woman in justifying their appearance.


“Where are you guys staying?”


“Up at my brother’s house in Carmel. He and his family are on sabbatical in Australia and it gives me a chance to show Diana around.” Bob Kinnig spoke for the first time, his voice perceptibly deep, but calm.


She suppressed a comment expounding the virtues of the difficulties of life flooded in innuendo. “I found this amazing little bed and breakfast just outside of downtown.”


“Yeah, and you still figure out a way to wake up before six am,” retorted the woman with a laugh.


“Yeah Diana, and how I far have I gone in my career?” The stinging sarcasm sent with the cruel intent of the snap of a rubber band on bare skin. “You two should get a drink.”


The pangs of jealousy and injustice did not settle in until she got back to her room and slept for three hours. Even though she adored her closest friend and husband as family, what fundamental flaw had kept her alone in the prime of life she had forged in the presence of self indulged labor and endless work. She was 37 years old and the epitome of a solitary individual living under the false pretense of a veil of friends, their faces recycled every few years, depending on her needs. This equation of sophism did not go hidden under the karmic values of life and the very thought of dodging a calculated and necessary retaliation kept her forehead wet some nights with a burning sheen of sweat.


The reality of the morning saturated her very being in the most subtle process of osmosis. It was if the fabric softener freshness of the viable ventricles of happiness flowed into the flawed and pained interior of her heart, stagnant with the weight of her world. She took a deep breath, the air scented with a combination of shampoo and suntan lotion, and verifying that she was truly a faraway from the temperate evergreen rain forest of home somewhere to the North. The blatant display of morning sunlight on some primal level caused her a bout of annoyance and she made the slow pilgrimage to the deck adjacent the room for a morning cigarette.


Endless as a parade of carpenter ants, the tourists were out in droves, the laughter for the sunshine, the cries of babies and the gentle conversations between lovers coalescing into a singular drone and almost synced perfectly with the blue and brown drapes of the shore, extending as far as the eye could see to the North and South. She allowed her imagination the luxury to propagate and explore the obviously pleasant nature of the surrounding environment. She remembered reading a J.D. Salinger short story about an Indian mystic reincarnated as a nine-year old boy in the height of the post-war world. Teddy, as the title and the name of the main character explained in depth his epiphany with spiritual enlightenment. The whole scene for the story was set on a cruise ship where vacation norms dominated, not unlike the festive fabric of the tapestry she was woven into. As Teddy had profoundly embraced the very makeup of the universe as god, and each and every fabric of reality god, she saw only love on this morning. Each and every vibrant material of the surrounding movement and still reality was forged with the imagination of a pristine kiss of a pure love akin to joy.


She took another drag from her cigarette as the ache of a tear tickled the dome of her cheek. Who in the throng of strangers would be able to understand me? The ticking of the symbolic clock came to an almost audible level outside of her being. She was engaged in an infinitesimal search and only her subconscious realized the true ramifications as her heart remained thwarted by the extremes of pure ambition and at the same time a quest for profound love.


At this moment a flurry of spiritual relativism and clairvoyance failed to materialize, but instead she thought about her father. She kept a picture of him hidden amongst her collection of encyclopedias and favorite novels and her bookshelf at home. The photo was taken before she and her brother were conceived. The man in the photograph possessed a look of joy, zest and a true love for life, a look that she had never witnessed as a child. She held onto the photograph as a evidence and a reminder to the reality of one of the harsh lessons learned early in life. He never loved us, she thought. She had not spoken to her father in over a decade, or more importantly he had not spoken to her.


Though the early sun glared upon the paradise next to the sea with a lavender like warmth, the tundra within her being remained rigid with ice and gloom. In a world and life flowing like a dream, she wondered if one day she would awaken to a differing reality or maybe an eternal nothingness. Sonja, stop, stop, her thoughts pleaded.


Her career flourishing and financial prospects firmly in hand, beautiful and intelligent, she shed the needless shackles from the past and looked out upon the ocean towards the future. I am a fighter, she thought. I did not quit when I was a girl and I will not quit now. Far off in the distance over the empty waves and blustery winds she could faintly see a trapdoor opening in pale blue heights of the sky. She smiled brightly as a yellow light pooled from the opening, the past forgotten for now, 20,000 feet above the ocean.

Another Long and Frustrating Summer

As Seattle professional sports teams continue to hover around mediocrity and why should they not as the Seattle-Tacoma metropolitan area ranks as the 15th largest media market and the second most liberal voters per capita in the nation, frustration looms for the true hometown fan. Cutting through all the statistics and hyperbole, Seattle has not garnered a major sports championship since the truly Supersonics of 1979. The frustration of flirtations with greatness have been abundant as both the '94 and '95 Sonics were the best teams in a Jordanless NBA during the regular season, but lost in the first round of the playoffs. How about the '04 Hawks and their magical journey to the Superbowl, finishing with a loss to Pittsburgh? Even the Mariners could do no wrong during the 2001 regular season and tallied a ridiculous 116 wins, but could not overcome September 11th and the nation's emotional connection with the Yankees in the ALCS. Forgetting the blunders of Cleveland, is Seattle currently the worst major sports city in the nation?

Family Guy Skit of the Week

Lois and Peter are talking in the kitchen.

Lois- "I can't believe they didn't pick me as the lead singer in the church choir. Can you believe that, Peter?"

Peter- "I know all about getting turned down, Lois. That's like the time was working as a James Joyce novel in a library for hot chicks."

Scene cuts to library setting with tables, chairs and books. Two attractive blondes are talking in the middle of the room.

Blonde #1- "Did you see all the periodicals this place has!"

Blonde #2- "I know! Now I can figure out what's important in the world and how to please my boyfriend, because Cosmo says so."

Blonde #1- “Books are heavy.”

Blonde conversation turns to idle chatter as Peter enters the picture from the left as the novel Ulysses, by James Joyce, his body and face the cover of the book itself, while his legs extend from the bottom and his arms from the side.

Peter- "Excuse me ladies, I couldn't help noticing how beautiful you looked and..."

Peter is cut off in mid sentence by Blonde #1 in the style of the movie Swingers at the Hollywood party.

Blonde #1- "What kind of car do you drive." Blonde #2 can be heard uttering in the background, "Are you a cardboard box?"

Peter- "Well, I don't really drive a car seeing that I am a book and in fact, well, we really didn't have cars in Dublin in the 19th century."

The two blondes stare at him in silence, their eyes wide and in a look of incomprehension.

Peter- "However if I could choose a car to drive, it would have to be an older model Chevy Impala, or quite possibly an El Camino"

Both woman immediately turn back to their conversation in a snap of indifference, while book Peter remains standing and looking at the two woman. He is forever ignored.

Peter- "Bitches."

The People's Republic of Bellevue?

My Teriyaki Joint Will Soon Become a 40 Story Condo

The realities of dining on at the same Teriyaki restaurant for an extended period of days is relatively impossible thanks to the simple properties of digestion. On this particular Wednesday, I was attempting the many variations of digestion at my favorite Teriyaki joint in Bellevue. As I masticated the sesame oil iceberg lettuce, subsequently prepared by an apt Korean staff, I thumbed through the morning edition of the Seattle P.I. an act prompting many nauseous feelings and a foreboding preview to the sects of digestion that awaited me. After inadvertently glaring into the op-ed section, the burn in my eyes and brain akin the effects of exposure to gamma intense radiation, I swiftly grasped for the hopeful fire extinguisher of the sports page as a balm for the burgeoning rage threatening the very base of my peace and dining experience. However, as if Seattle baseball is indefinitely cursed after failing to garner a world championship in the season of 2001 which featured a robust 116 wins, the day’s sports headline specified the pathetic ineptitude ingrained in this year’s offensive attack. At this juncture my angry chair was stacked high with phone books of rage nearly to the average height of the 250 construction cranes outsourced from China surrounding the diminutive strip mall where I dined. As if on cue, the torii katsu arrived, a blank canvas for every conceivable condiment on the already inadequately sized table. Teriyaki Bowl serves a high volume through out the day and the idea is to create a high turnover rate for customers and thus cash flow, so literally no room exists for eating and reading. In this environment of Laissez-Faire and tempered anarchy, my angst was subdued by the tonic of food and I reluctantly placed the sports page on the carpeted floor with a delicate throwing motion. In fact it is possible to eat and read, but the act of multitasking requires a surgeon’s dexterity with chopsticks and my inner wa remained tarnished by a myriad of thoughts.

As I dipped my first piece of chicken into the sauce receptacle, I noticed an attractive young woman around the age of twenty walking into the restaurant. I always play a game and attempt to predict what a customer will order as an indication of their look. I picked the veggie teriyaki special for this young vixen, however to my disappointment she never even reached the front counter. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that she hovered around one of the empty tables, casting a furtive glance around the room. As a mosquito targeting a major vein, the stealth like qualities of the insect overshadowed by a much deeper reality of pure evil, the young woman proceeded to pour the restaurant’s soy sauce into an empty cup she was carrying. After her act of theft, so deft and beautiful in the Machiavellian sense, she nonchalantly walked out of the door. I continued to stare at her with an intense glance and noticed that she entered the front door of the adjacent sub shop. I was completely flummoxed by the young lady’s actions. Immediately, the thought swept through my mind that there were roughly 200 things wrong with the recent events of indiscretion. The two businessmen who were situated in front of me and faced the scene of the crime, failed to register any semblance of a reaction. Stunned, I finished my meal in haste while pondering the spread of Stalinism and five year plans like wildfire in the temperate urban rainforests of the Northwest.

I opened the front door of the adjacent sub shop and searched the main restaurant area for the young offender. I spotted her almost immediately sitting with a couple of young men around her age. I swiftly approached the table with confidence and spoke in my radio voice. “Miss, I saw you in the teriyaki shop. Do you know what you did was wrong?” She looked at me as a knothole, the confusion spreading across her face in a non verbal “huh?” The two guys sat with smiles and nodded their heads.

“You are free to do what you want in life, but just remember your actions have consequences,” I ended my speech shrouded with the spirituality of a true mountain nomad, awaiting her reaction. Very meekly she uttered, “I’m sorry.” Satisfied, I left to contemplate the day’s events, the two young men laughing and berating her for her stupidity.

Speaking in legal terms, one is entitled to a restaurant’s condiments once they have made a purchase. In this non-verbal agreement the property of the restaurant in the common area takes on a meaning of ownership for the patron. Napkins, straws and disposable chopsticks fall under the same umbrella. Since the young woman made no purchase or verbal agreement with the patrons by simply asking for permission, her actions could technically be qualified as petty theft.

On the reaches of a thought experiment the young woman’s behavior possessed inclinations of oblivious sentiments and total lack of empathy. Whether the patterns in her mind were established by the home environment or societal norms are important questions. Did the young men at her table wager a dare or was her act a simple culmination of a sophomoric prank? On a philosophical level, does the young woman not adhere to the ideals of private property outside of her closet or her Jetta and are all women at a similar stage of development simply natural socialists? As a gender, women are far more inclined towards the ideals of sharing, equality and nurturing. I entertained these thoughts as I walked across the parking lot to my car until I was nearly flattened by a steam roller and decapitated by the sign girl as she practiced flipping between "stop" and "slow". Of course the workers were clearing the way to erect another crane.

Gazing back towards the sub shop, I noticed the front window reflected the obvious chaos of my current plight. The reality made brilliant and vivid by the early afternoon tempered sunlight. As if the properties of karma tilted imperceptibly save for the quantum realm, the face of the young thief was clearly visible next to the mirror of my reality. In the split screen of our worlds on one side I stood white with terror in the mild sunlight while on the other she laughed, the toothy and wry smile beaming with the realization that my near death experience served justice for a generation changing the world beyond recognition.