Apparently there was some kind of celebration today. I mean, obviously, but, it was so surreal and paranoia-inducing. Walking down the street and lo! there's a parade goin' on in front of you. And the fireworks. Gunshots going off periodically. I guess pyrotechnics are legal here; where I'm from, if there's a loud gunshot sound it means that, you know, somebody's actually shooting stuff. Call in your children, lock the doors. Freaks me right the heck out, hearing that going on.
It's such an arbitrary notion, isn't it. Declaration of independence. Ratify that, July 4th, 1776, celebrate that for whatever reason. And keep celebrating it. Britain didn't acknowledge the United State's independence until September of 1783-- so this isn't really a celebration of externally recognized independence as it is the independence of rejecting others' reality and substituting one's own.
...Sounds about right?
Murrica!
I did go check out the parade, though. Parades mean horses. And horses mean horses. Naked ones. Woo. I wove up and down the rope of the parade, locating the positions of all of them; horses and riders, horses and horse-drawn wagons. They were alright, I guess. Not as many of them as I would have liked, and none of them defecated on the parade route, which was disappointing. One of them did urinate in the street for, a little bit. Not all that vinegary in aroma; more of a brief tinkle than a full-blast steaming stream; some kid's head was blocking my view of most of it. Not a total bust, but... man that was lacking.
...I'm kind of at a lost place right now.
While I was winding upstream of the parade route, near the end of it. You see people selling bottled water, for 50 cents, for a dollar. The lady offers me water for free, and I accept, though not that thirsty. It's still water. The gent she's with, as well, he offers me a free copy of the Bible.
Well.
Christians behaving like actual Christians, that's a rare sight now-a-more. Handing out, for free, water and bibles. ESV. I accept this as well.
I drink the water along the way; at the end of the route, when it's clear there won't be any more horses or parade, I continue walking a bit, find a tree to settle down under, and read the first couple chapters.
Eden is representative of a temple of sorts. Waters flow from it, four cardinal directions, into lands rich in natural resources. How obvious of symbolism could you get. I don't know.
It is decided Adam needs a companion. He names the beasts by himself, and only then does he have a wife formed from his rib.
Adam and Eve are naked and unashamed.
So I read the bible. And I still screw up. Sometimes it feels like you can't do anything right. Sometimes it feels like you're the greatest and could never fail. Let's review this post again; I read back over it just now and, it's still basically spot-on. My worship is to create art, apparently. I'm the greatest, I could never fail. And I still have to live my life-- and I can't do anything right. I washed off a paintbrush in someone's drinking cup! That's my worship?
Questions, always questions. What is my system of morality. Why are there so many who are spiritual-but-not-religious. Why are there so many non-religious in general, when spirituality is wet and religion is dry. Dry is good. Comfortable. Wet spirituality, it's like milk, doesn't mix with the Shredded Wheat of religion, can't make it soggy. They commingle, but do not mix. Maybe they're at odds with each other sometimes; horsepiss is my spirituality, I never feel more profoundly awed. But my spirituality chafes against my religion.
My religion. Its moral system has crystalized like a skeleton framework for me, though this morality is not my own; difficult to keep at times, stupefyingly easy at others, the sure hallmark of something entirely arbitrary, some moral compass with cardinal directions from some other world, North South East West alien concepts. It's still a compass I try to follow. Spirituality is emotional, irrational, more arbitrary than the greatest arbitraries of religion. Religion's arbitraries lie, I now realize, in acting like spirituality is non-arbitrary.
So I read the bible, and still screw up. Rocky Raccoon finds Gideon's Bible in his hotel room, still charges in to showdown against Danny. After he fails that, though, the bible is still back in his room. I like to imagine that that's when he derives some comfort from it.
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