Rat and Dog

There has to be a deeper meaning to life.

Here comes another of my aimless wander- ings, my mind has went pass it's level of stress bearing endurance to mute resignation. I'm tired of freaking out about tomorrow, and am ready to see past it to the next day. It's a natural progression, it happens to rats who are being eaten by snakes. Endorphines surge through their brains, numbing them from pain, and turning reality into a thick gumbo soup as it is slowly being swallowed, many times ass first, into the gaping mouth of it's predator.

I too feel like that rat, staring off into nothing, a dream-like quality to my eyes as my head sticks out of some closing mouth. And what does this soup-like reality reveal to me? That there has to be a deeper meaning to life. Life is more than just finding a place to eat, and shit and fuck, a roof over your head so to speak, someone to understand you, children to run around your feet (not necessarily your own), good health, a clear mind.

And then it hits me. A clear mind. How many homeless people have bobbed up and down this low on the social ladder and finally SCHNAPPED? How many of them lost their marbles fucking with all of these pills, and therapists, and departments and drones and just said, in their minds, ENOUGH! I wonder as I feel myself as taut as a guitar string, straining with a twang as I'm still drawn tighter and tighter. The pressure...oh I mean the FUN just never stops!

Could it be made to break you, lead you to drinking, to pharma- ceutical recreation? I know some that it has, such as our loving street urchins from the past, The Pipe Crew who live to drink, exist to drink, and will probably die drinking. But just when I think I'm past the point of human endurance, there is a slacking of the string! I am myself again. I'm past the stress and can see past the inevitable. I was told that to lose a member of the body, the body feels nothing because the damage is so traumatic that there is just no sense in overburdening the brain with such confusing signals. The stimulus coming from the eyes are enough.

There is no need to catastro- phize any further, the mind realizes that it does no good, and so I instantly feel better. Wonderful even. My internal compass swings around to the more important instead of the most trivial. My problem solving skills take over, and I quickly begin going over the data in my head to rectify my situation. This is crucial to moving past the hump, the ability to see your way clear. I'm a free man from my worries. It's simple.

The story of the rat, now the story of the dog.

Pavlov's dog to be exact. Why is it just like Pavlov's mutt that humans are just the same way? Why is it that we can be engrossed in our own issues, like worrying an old shoe or chasing the mailman down the block, or even just wagging out tail as we sniff up the leg of the neighbor's dress until we hear that bell ring!!

What is it about that goddamn bell that causes us to drop everything, all fear, all anxious- ness, all pleasure, all attention and go running in it's direction, saliva just pouring out of our mouths. Albeit Pavlov's dogs were in a lab and hotwired to test their saliva responses, I see them as running to a dinner bell like children in a field, bolting like fire to the source of the ringing.

What is it about that bell that makes us drop everything and go on, just hit it. Move motherfucker, just move. What is it...oh, and that bell can be something different for every human being on the surface of the earth. It could be a great shoe sale, a new car, an episode of 'The Price is Right' or the 'Sopranos', it could be a well cooked meal of your favorite dish, or a naked body ready for sex. It can be anything that causes us to salivate and change direction suddenly and surely. And I know that you all have one.

What is it to you? What throws your switch, sends your rudder hard to starboard, the screws of your ponderous ship turning. Well then my friends, may you set your heading to brighter futures for all of you. Even though the sun may be setting in the West, it doesn't mean the finish. Some of us have good intestinal batteries, and can weather the storm. I hope so, because it looks like it will be bad.

I've already been through a squall so I know what to expect on the streets. I consider it a squall because it was only two years living out of a bag. Fuck, it made me only tougher. Now I'm feeling weak. Weaker than I was once. But we all pull through now don't we.

We can either do that or be the rat staring out of a snake's mouth. It's up to us to choose.

I want to be the dog.

Hobobob