WHY NOT?

The BORING age, the NOTHING to say age. The age of the BLAH!

Yes, we are living in this age - despite space travel, potential thermonuclear extinction, increase in major earthquakes and other calamities, crime, unprecedented population-explosion, famine bomb about to explode, runaway inflation (with world depression on its heels), an abundance or excess of crisis from ecology to education. We live in an age of BLAH because original thinking is at its lowest. Completely opposite to the zenith of living life despite the fact that there are nearly as many life styles as there are people, and many brag about "doing their own thing" but hardly anyone does. We are assaulted on every side by politicians on the one hand and the media/press on the other, with advertising hitting us head on! We are told what, when and how to think, act, buy, do - and what's worse is that most of us do as we are told! We are all forced into a dry, dull mode. We are the Coca-Cola generation, pop-bottle babies. We alleviate the pain at one end with aspirin and at the other with Preparation H (hemorrhoids) ointment. We smoother the rest with roll-on, spray and aerosol ointments containing medical ingredients for therapeutic purposes, powders and oils. Time, required for proper enjoyment of the quality of life, is just not available (though we have the same 24 hours a day all our forefathers did since Adam & Eve in the Garden) - so we substitute profit-making (for someone else) "instants" for as many facets of life as possible: instant coffee, instant tea, instant you and me! Instant TV meals, instant cup-a soup, instant sauces, instant food. Instant divorce, instant potatoes, tomatoes, puddings. Paper diapers, preservatives clog our toilets or a potential cause of disease at the dump. Red, blue, black, white are our favourite colours. Bland is our favourite brand. Easy credit, no-pain payments: buy now, pay...later... Smooth. Soft. Blah, Blah, Blah...!!! Why not get out of the track, out of the routine? And live just a little. Why not go to the grocery store, get some good meat, fish and some fresh (not frozen or instant) vegetables, some spices of your own choosing and come home and make a good Portuguese stew, that takes two days before it really tastes good? Why not turn the TV off for a day, week, and read a good book instead, or build a cabinet, a new corner in the garden, or sew a new dress, or attend a lecture with the whole family, go to the Zoo, have a picnic (weather permitting), take a walk? Why not take some time to think - about why we do the things we do, or don't do? WHY NOT?