Flying By the Pound 1
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Category Archives: Fluff & social commentary
A Jan. 1 Cartoon
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Spider Cartoon 1
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Coffee Cartoon 2
Coffee Cartoon 1
Ernie & The Forest of Envy
Once upon a time, there lived a small rotund creature named Ernie.
Ernie was a happy sort of chap.
He liked meandering through his domain, chatting with friends here and there.
One day though, Ernie happened upon a patch of forest he had never seen before.
Ernie decided to explore further, completely ignoring all childhood tales of woe associated with dark woods.
As he entered, he passed small warning signs that are sometimes referred to as foreshadowing.
Yep, he pretty much blithely sailed on through many such warning signs..
Ernie wasn’t always the most astute observer, especially when he was having a good time.
As he sauntered on, Ernie didn’t really notice that the light was getting dimmer and that he was slowly forgetting his way back home.
All of a sudden, Ernie stumbled upon something he found highly unusual – a person with a crown!
Ernie watched, fascinated! He had never seen a crown before – and, oh – how it gleamed..
Ernie found himself possessed by a strange yearning – never had he seen anything so enchanting..
As he thought back to his life, it seemed but pale and ridiculous compared to the beauty of the creature’s crown.
Ernie grew obsessed by the idea of the golden crown! He had to have it!
What Ernie didn’t know that he had inadvertently stumbled into the Forest of Envy, which blinded the souls of all who entered, filling them with insatiable longing for the fortunes of others.
All he could think about was the crown – the precious crown.
By night he would lie awake in the forest, ruminating obsessively about the crown.
By day, he would watch the crowned one, a dark and hulking shadow.
Needless to say, Ernie grew increasingly unhappy and dissatisfied.
One day though, Ernie noticed something strange.
The crowned one was staring fixedly at another in the distance – one with a crown.. and a sceptre!
As Ernie watched, he could almost see a transformation take place in the crowned one…
Ernie wanted to yell – what are you so unhappy about, you at least have a crown!
All of a sudden Ernie was struck by a realization.
And with that, Ernie’s heart grew large towards the crowned one.
With those single words, the clear rays of light came shining through the Forest of Envy.
And with that, Ernie decided it was time to go home and strolled away, leaving the changed forest behind.
Years later, when asked about his time in the Forest of Envy, Ernie was fond of expounding the wisdom of Bertrand Russell, and would simply say:
“To find the right road out of this despair civilized man must enlarge his heart as he has enlarged his mind. He must learn to transcend self, and in so doing to acquire the freedom of the Universe.” – Bertrand Russell
The last of those summer hooves
Infinity, you say? Right this way please.
You probably all remember those glorious two months of summer when you were a kid, when school was out for the best time of the year and the next hazy cricket-hum days were spent running around like wild, swimming, playing, exploring, until the sun went down and your parents called you home. I can always distinctly remember that the end of summer – and going back to school – meant putting on my socks. The socks would feel real funny, as it was the softest thing my callused feet (a.k.a. “summer hooves”) experienced in what was like, forever.
This memory always gets me to thinking. If only I had known the very last time my little summer hooves experienced that soft velvety sockness I would have KNOWN that was the last time that we ever had a full two months of the best times of our lives to run around carefree like the wind…
I read somewhere once that we humans are eternal optimists, that we live our lives as though the moments ahead are infinite, and that at any time we choose, we could experience any one moment again. The reality is that these experience possibilities are not infinite, they are finite, and when it comes to the sum total of our lives we never really know when we’ve experienced the last of something.
For example, over your lifetime you may only fully watch 134 sunsets, you might only ever have (gasp!) 57 perfect cappuccinos, or 78 swims in the ocean… but the possibility of the 135th sunset, the 79th swim, and the 58th perfect cappuccino, is always there. It seems that for us, Pandora’s Box rings eternal and it’s a blessing, as we think that there will always be another sunset to fully appreciate, never really knowing that the one we watched way back when was actually our last.
simonandfinn 