bury the past™: 04/01/2007

everybody loves the sunshine...

You are The Sun

Happiness, Content, Joy.

The meanings for the Sun are fairly simple and consistent.

Young, healthy, new, fresh. The brain is working, things that were muddled come clear, everything falls into place, and everything seems to go your way.

The Sun is ruled by the Sun, of course. This is the light that comes after the long dark night, Apollo to the Moon's Diana. A positive card, it promises you your day in the sun. Glory, gain, triumph, pleasure, truth, success. As the moon symbolized inspiration from the unconscious, from dreams, this card symbolizes discoveries made fully consciousness and wide awake. You have an understanding and enjoyment of science and math, beautifully constructed music, carefully reasoned philosophy. It is a card of intellect, clarity of mind, and feelings of youthful energy.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

smooth criminal...

two sides to an interesting discussion...

With the rampant anti-americanism seemingly growing out of control, i've been trying to follow both sides of the argument. One of the biggest problems i've had with that (and this is true of both sides), is that there are very few objective arguments.

this first article, starts of with some background behind the french, and their dislike of us.

Death to US! Anti-Americanism Examined - BBC

it's kind of understandable, from an old world perspective, as to how this country, with it's amalgam of races and cultures, and no real lineage or association with any monarchy, could be seen as being poor. it must be even more upsetting, as time progresses, as to how quickly we have climbed to the top. overall opportunity, quality of life, access to education, technology, etc... together, these are all far exceeding anything that the majority of the world population has.

thats one part, to why i think the world in general has a problem with us. we started with the weak, and the poor, and now, we have it all. that in itself is a testament to what our forefathers were able to accomplish. in a shallower point of view, i think it's the "have nots" that are silently gritting their teeth, wanting, but not realizing that quite a bit of work, over hundreds of years (all towards a single goal), has created it all.

the other part, however, is based on what we, as americans appear to be doing with that. sure it's easy enough to overlook the hundreds of years, and thousands of steps that our country men have taken, and I admit at this point in my life, i'm only now starting to understand what it is they have done, but every day it seems most of us do just that. we overlook it, we take it for granted. we don't set out intending to be arrogant, or lazy, or demanding, but thats what we have grown accustomed to. so of course when we travel abroad, we look like boors and trailer trash...

sorry, a little segue here...

i've recently come to the conclusion that it's not 100% about the destination or goal, but that the actual journey (or struggle) is more important. once something has been realized, it's finished, complete. it's time to move on. sure, the feeling of achievement is wonderful, but it's fleeting. the struggle however, the late nights, and the epiphanies and the stress and the overcoming, that is what i feel makes any achievement more valuable. the journey, the struggle itself makes us stronger. actually finishing it, well, sometimes you get lucky and do something amazing without really trying that hard. and sometimes, you get the most satisfaction out of the simplest tasks, only because you had a hard time with it. anyhow, on to what I was saying earlier.

thats a big part of what is missing on our part. the struggle. every single generation before us wanted one thing. a better place for their children. better food, better jobs, better health care, a better world. and dammit, we all fucking have that now. it really irks the shit out of me when i overhear someone saying "it's too hard to find a job", of "i don't make enough money"... this is the best place in the whole world to just that! so while we might not be arrogant on purpose, i can totally see why people around the world, in the middle of "TheStruggle™", of wondering if they can feed their family, or hoping that they don't catch a stray bullet or bomb, or living with four or five other families in an apartment one of us wouldn't want to live in alone... i can see why the look down us. we have forgotten what we have right in front of us.

part two coming up in a little while...