Riddled

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What do you believe? Why trust yourself when, time and again, you’ve led yourself astray? Astray, astray. Ashtray. If only leading oneself astray were a lucrative career path. And as for faith: Faith in what? Faith in what you know? Alright. Or, all right. You have faith in knowing what you know is wrong. Or, at best, what you know is riddled with wrongs. Go? BOLDLY go? Where? Spend? How much? Write? How much? Spend it all? Go everywhere? Write until the ink runs out? Write until the paper runs out? Type until the fingers ache? Ah, but recall Mister Rather’s sage advice.* What do you want? What, REALLY? Self-reliance? Ah, but you get soooooooooooooooooo lonesome, don’t you? Lonesome and loathsome. You suffer soooooooooooooooooo much doubt, no? You want a lover. You want a companion. You want to “go free” with a lover-companion. And you don’t want a boss. Well, who DOES? Well, frankly? Many do. All too many seek to be led. But you? No. As the Bio-Farter oft said, “You can’t take instruction.” True. You don’t want a boss unless that boss is a competent publisher or an accomplished producer with deep pockets and strong connections. But which faith to embrace? Why the need to choose? For Chrissake, why can’t “the Almighty” put His / Her / Its foot down and settle the matter? Settle something, for Chrissake. Why must we shed blood over competing ideologies, if there is, in fact, one correct philosophy / faith / truth? Short of that knowledge, how are you supposed to know the correct course of action? Mind the wise words of Mr. Goldman: “Nobody knows anything.” Indeed. Be it Hollywood or Religion or pizza toppings, “Nobody knows anything.” That said, all the best academic research supports dollar-cost averaging your nest egg into low-cost, broadly-diversified index mutual funds and/or ETFs. But, you know, who has the patience, right? And, besides, Pets.com was way sexier than VFINX, no? But beyond that, what to believe? Who to trust? What to do? What to do DIFFERENTLY? What do you know? What do you NEED to know? How to proceed? Who to ask? Don’t stop. Keep going. Come clean. Like the man said… 

14 April 2007 
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