I'm amazed at how fluid life can be...there are no constants and nothing is certain. Other than what Jack so eloquently describes as the certainty of "nobody know[ing] what's going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old." This consistent constant while seemingly pessimistic is quite the opposite if one looks more closely at its inherent meaning.

Life is not for naught, it's just simply short and it is our duty to make sure that we, we humans do what is best for community. Even the word or the concept of community seems foreign once we include politics, religion, spirituality and stubbornness into the equation. What happened to the commonality of shared genes and the idea that god created all as one...as equals?

When did manifest destiny and capitalism become so prevalent while at the same time these same shared values, Darwinian values at best, hope to oppress those that cannot while the "can haves" can?

Darwinian...an ideology hated by most who sit on the right side of the road, however, loved when it comes to rights of people and the possible or maybe even probable origins of existence on the left.

Last Sunday morning I couldn't sleep...so I stayed awake and watched the sun come up over the coast...and while I couldn't really see the coast I knew that the sun was rising from the East and would eventually set in the West. The streets of San Francisco were barren for the most part and I walked up Polk Street to Pine and found my way to a park where I sat and contemplated the reasons for why I couldn't afford health care and why I didn't make more money or enough money to buy a nice sports car or a condo in the Marina. Darwinian I thought...

I wasn't strong enough...that must be the reason. Survival of the fittest I thought.

That guy with the hot car driving by me as I sat there in the park must have things figured out more or better than I could ever have imagined. That other woman, with the dog...a dog so cute that it could be on the cover of magazines...she must have things figured out as well...and while I hated dogs, she must've known something that I hadn't yet had the opportunity to learn myself.

Down the hill, church bells rang and they echoed throughout the hills of the city and I am sure that I would have heard them as well, even if I was still sleeping in my bed at home...but this time...it was different and I walked down the hill away from the park...

I entered alone into an old building, one that had been there since it was resurrected after the earthquake of 1906 and walked up dusty stairs into a hall and found my place in the back where no one could find me. The smell of incense was heavy but familiar and forgiving and while I don't remember much after that initial moment of entry into this spiritual place, I felt at peace.

I prayed for my friends with cancer, with heartache, and for those like myself who haven't yet found their way but were so close and were on the right path whether they knew it or not. And when I got home...I lit some incense hoping that the scent, the smoke reaches you to let you know that I am there as well and will be there always.