_____________

From my bicycle owner's manual:

-Ride at night only if necessary.

I see, that, if it is ever necessary to ride, one must ride only at night.

Or, why would they tell you not to ride at night unless necessary?

Are we all awaiting, Lord, your iron-clad command?

Have you, really, ever wanted, or asked, to live forever?

Please, consider with me, because I'd so interesting a revelation thereabouts, how selfish.

Were a person to ask to live only half forever, it would, exactly, surmount to the same duration!

And it would similarly be no less, nor fewer, if respectful of all six-plus-billion people we know, we expected, each, to own our mere one-six-plus-billionth of eternity!

And I'm launching our slogan, "Forever is For Everyone," and asking that we all join in.

But having acknowledged the duty to blog of good things, not bad, blog of happy, not sad, I should deliver the antidote to any bitterness, even of regret.

I don't know why I had felt MyOpera to be the welcome arms to my first blog experience. Sometimes it's said that people, even normal ones, will mistake the coldness of strangers for the warmth of friends, and vice-versa. If I have done so, I hope you feel yourselves the beneficiaries of my uninvited warmth, and not its victims.

Whether art is imitation of life, or life imitation of art had become abundantly clear to me. It is both, at sundry times, and there is an art which, although it imitates life, is emphatically not a role-model. Similarly what art is exemplary, a paragon for life, may have embellished upon its role-model too. None should complain, because it keeps art and life in productive and beneficial cooperation, but if there is a distinction in name between the art on the one hand and art on the other, I have never seen or heard it.

Do you care to bear with me as I draw a finer distinction? Imagine for me that art, which is properly called "art," is as exemplary a model for life as the easy chair, or the first-class cabin, for the amenities and comforts of travel. Now (are you bearing with me?), imagine the superlative ease, of Jamaican beaches at hotel resorts, with expense-account buffet, free drinks, live music and dance, with complimentary massage. Analogous to the differences in degree between one comparative comfort and another, there is a spectrum of inconvenience: from the every day chore and the common exertion, to the Olympic gold medal trials, and the dare-devil missions. If there is art that is "art," which is expressly a counter-example to life, then perhaps there is art which is Olympian in the extent and dimension of its contrariness. Unfulfilled with imitations of life which are inimitable, such an artist must excel and surpass barriers of inimitability. It is his vigilance to be abominable. Never must the layman 'attempt such art at home.' Only marvellous self-discipline and years of specialized training has enabled the artist to forbear against the 'perfect storm' of countermanding forces. And it is art still.

I had not hoped to make blogging, an uncharted frontier in my walks, into a rant. My hope had been instead to paint the future's hopes and dreams. I might try to explain why, in my last post, I had digressed, but the truth is whether I'd excuse or not, there is uncomfortable baggage that won't otherwise disappear.

I recall for instance the day-care in Co. where the big kid, whose name was unknown to me, had thrown the deck of cards and refused to pick them up. From my vantage, as I was a very small kid on that date, he was a notoriously big kid, since I knew not whether the woman who was supervising us had been any bigger. She insisted that the cards be picked up, to which he had replied, "It's a free country."

I wanted to object, and I'd struggled to frame in words the idea that had been vaguely impressed upon my mind to the effect that the misuse of other's property is not a protected form of expression. I even felt some of the imperative to interject when the lady failed to command that explanation herself. It seemed as though the day would be lost while I'd timidity not to pipe up before elders, "biggers," those with the irreverence to throw cards, and those duly authorized to punish it.

Perhaps you Opera-ites shall have something to comment on that situation, perhaps not. It was at least in all aspects clearly understood to me, even then, what was going on. I don't mean to say that I'd sympathy then for card-throwing, when I'd not, or that the supervisor lady's loss of face made sense, or that there was any excuse for my reticence. I had at times been reliant that "the truth will out," that "right makes might," and importantly that the fates will favor the meek, and that justice even for the silent would be served.

After the context of my previous post I have an apology to offer to America, who had been listening at that time, as she is now. Certainly if I had imagined it to matter to YOU, I'd have interjected with some rationale for my understandings of freedoms and liberties, however poorly articulated they may have been.

"You can be 'righteous' by some of the people some of the time, but you can't be more righteous than any of the people all of the time."