As a nation, we snapped out of it for a bit and I did too. I was letting the onset of middle age act as an excuse to let myself go soft. I was too old to put back on the uniform--the Marines didn't need 40 year old avionics techs, plus the wife and kids have first claim on me now.
The least I could do, to show some solidarity with actual warriors, is to get back into the habit of PT. (Good for you, good for me.)
I was reminded of the below bit from Melville,
Some moments passed, during which the thick vapor came from his mouth in quick and constant puffs, which blew back again into his face. "How now," he soliloquized at last, withdrawing the tube, "this smoking no longer soothes. Oh, my pipe! hard must it go with me if thy charm be gone! Here have I been unconsciously toiling, not pleasuring-aye, and ignorantly smoking to windward all the while; to windward, and with such nervous whiffs, as if, like the dying whale, my final jets were the strongest and fullest of trouble. What business have I with this pipe? This thing that is meant for sereneness, to send up mild white vapors among mild white hairs, not among torn iron-grey locks like mine. I'll smoke no more-" He tossed the still lighted pipe into the sea. The fire hissed in the waves; the same instant the ship shot by the bubble the sinking pipe made. With slouched hat, Ahab lurchingly paced the planks.
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3 comments:
The sad part is that there are still people who refuse to realize that there is evil afoot out in the world.
I hope the smokin' ruin of a major city is not what is necessary to wake them up. Or at least shut them up. I fear that is what is in our future.
I think you are right, unfortunately.
D'oh! My daughter was signed in on this computer and so the above remark is by me, not her.
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