Why is a decent, fulfilling life so hard to obtain?

'Cause we are internally contradictory creatures. Our advanced, complex intellect and sensibility is out of synch with our ruder animal natures. Maybe after some more thousands of years of evolution, we might stop needing the pills.

Brandon, I don't know that the desire for a greater good has disappeared. If you look at the surface - People magazine and Jon Stewart - it seems so. But if you look at the lives of friends, family, and co-workers, you'll probably find a lot more depth and goodness. There's a lot of volunteer work and charitable donations that you don't normally see.

I'll agree that we've become a society that brags about its vices and conceals its virtues. We're weird hypocrites. I think we're all afraid of bragging, of putting ourselves up as examples of decency, because it seems anti-democratic. Even as I write this, I know I'd never talk about the causes and good deeds I've been involved in.

Anyway, greedy industries have no power if you ignore them. We may not realize this society-wide, but we do as individuals, and the aggregate effect can be powerful.

To answer the lead in question on whether I feel depressed. No.

But I do get concerned when I look around my house and wonder how I accumulated all this stuff. I've got all sorts of stuff from different "eras" of my being. I am "Consumer Man"

I own guitars (10), madolins, basses, amps, old effects, 4 tumbadors (congas), lots of percussion stuff and that's just the stuff a currently have... I've traded/sold tons more musical stock. I have a freakin' Hammond B-3 in the garage... where mice go to die.

Books! OMG! I hate to give the books away, but I'm out of room; why not!?! I'll claim them.

Nic Nac's from 2 sets of parents, and our own. The kids are gone... and so is there stuff. I want to go Spartan, I want buddist furnishings... a smaller place in a wide open area... good gravy... Now I understand, I'm having an anxiety moment here. If I was crazy I would chainsaw the whole mess and burn it all! But I'm too "cheap" to do that. If I had to do it all over again... keeps resounding in my thoughts. I woulda, shoulda... maybe I am nuts.

I still play music, I still read, I still buy junk; When will it stop? Who will "want" all this stuff? Or, will it go into the local dump for lack of interest. Is that what it's all about? Hep me, hep me....

But seriously, all kidding aside. I really need to pare down. Yard sale... too specialized, yard sales are for old dishes and childrens clothes.

Salvation Army here I come! Look out taxman, I'm claiming it all!

TTFN!