...three, two, one......

....this is it........outta here after today. Feeling ok about everything.

Humility

So Your Humble Chronicler has developed a not unusual and, dare we admit, trendy, even, morning habit. The habit has developed over the time period since January, when The Band launched wholeheartedly into living a more healthy existence -- at least being as conscious of what We Daily Consume as we are for what we feed our pets. In a nutshell, we've been stopping off at Starbucks each morning before coming into the office. While our original choice was a grande latte quad -- which was always delicious, mind you -- Better Judgement has since kicked in, and The Band now approves of our daily grande house coffee (less impact in terms of both calories and $$$).

Anyway, that's the habit. The habit takes us to the heart of Oakland, which is a typical inner-city, university urban campus, gritty, high-traffic, heavily populated area. Lately, The Band has been seeing a homeless dude in the area -- one of many, sadly -- but this guy stands out. Basically, it's because he's got a pretty serious Jesus-look thing going on for himself (I tend to think it's not something he planned) -- long reddish-brown hair, full beard, sandals, torn pants, no shirt. He's also accompanied by two decent sized stray dogs, which he's clearly devoted to, though I think they're just fellow street creatures. Anyway, I've seen this guy before, and I think the whole homeless thing in America is an unconscionable tragedy, and I'm moving out of this hard-hearted city in four days, so I figured I'd give him a few bucks, figured he'd need it, figured he could use it. And he very nicely declined. Very politely and in a way that didn't make me feel uncomfortable in any way, he declined. Said that, until he finds a place to live, he doesn't want money, because it'll just get lost or stolen or confiscated by the cops. Said he hates being homeless, and he wants to get a place and a job as soon as possible -- wants to get married and have kids, "if I still have time -- I'm getting pretty old" -- he looks about late-40's to me. And then he proceeded to talk to me about how there are forces at work here to commercialize our city parks, and that he really needs people he can work with in order to resist this movement, "in a peaceful, reasonable and legal way."

Will we miss the city?

Sure. Cities are neat. They are the zoos of humanity. And much more. And much less.

We really should return to this topic in the future, because there is no time at present to do it justice. And there is no time like the present. Meanwhile, does anybody need five bucks?