Altered States -OR- Where There's A Will...

Part of the human condition? Learning to live with the aches, pains and attenuated expectations? Our lot in life? To elevate and embody our hopes and dreams in a seemingly futile search for the Quisatz Haderach? Looking for The Lorax who speaks for US then meekly returning to our shrinking patch of turf where we can almost make sense of things by closing out the wicked world?

You know you should stop looking, but you can't help it. Where there's this much horseshit, there MUST be a Pony. Someday, someway, someone will find it and there will be Pony rides for everyone.

A couple of decades ago I was a somewhat cynical believer. I KNEW that at any minute there would be a societal epiphany: While crazy can be fun and exciting, FULL BLOWN BATSHIT CRAZY should be avoided. I began a quest to find sane, rational kindred to stand with, knowing they were out there. They just had to be, right? Otherwise, the only viable option would be to build/find a bunker, crawl in it and close the door.
Nope, in a civilized society, that's shouldn't be Plan A.

A civilized society? Who's kidding who?

I was born into and raised in an exclusionary society. A rigged game with a stacked deck, moving goalposts and exponentially changing rules that sought to further exclude to advantage the house through clever deceptions of inclusion. Sandlot rules codified through Little League sanctions. Endless promises of a better tomorrow (for some).

A decade ago we crossed a new threshold into Opposite World where Full-blown Batshit Crazy was in charge. Viral in nature, parasitic in design, it took the promise and turned it into something totally unrecognizable. ALL the rules were changed. Even the premise was transmogrified. None dared to openly exhibit outrage or bewilderment. Everything remained as it always was, nothing to see here, move along.

This time the conversion was so open and blatant that it must be for the greater good. Right? In this Brave New World of facade, what hope remained for such a jaded cynic as I?

Tomorrow!

Holy Shit! I AM Don Quixote. My madness is stern and unshakable.
I am James Bolivar DiGriz, living in the wainscoting of Opposite World.

"Laying low, seeking out the poorer quarters,
Where the ragged people go.
Lookin for the places, only they would know. Paul Simon- The Boxer