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				 Dedication
    To Alexis: who has always believed in me.  If I write this book to try to
  make money or to gain recognition and respect as an author and student of
  life, I will fail.  This book is about enthrallment to ideas, to human
  abstract inventions, which realise a virtual slavery of most human beings.
  My motive for writing must be to fully understand that notion and articulate
  it to others.  Perhaps some other authors may be able to work without such
  motivation.  I cannot!  My mind doesn't work that way.  That is not to say
  that I would not be happy to have recognition, respect and material comfort
  (including, especially, the ability to properly care for my children); it
  only says it cannot be my primary reason to write.


				 Other's Dedication
    I don't expect to have this work well received by traditional publishers
  or to make a lot of money but I will dedicate it to Life in the hopes it may
  contribute to survival; mine and everything else's.  The least personal
  reward I can expect is an amusing way to use my time.  That is reason enough
  to continue writing.

				  Credits
    The list of authors I've read who have either affirmed or inspired my
  thought about culture and society is nearly interminable.  And, it is being
  constantly lengthened.  But Aldous Huxley, Samuel Clements and Kurt Vonnegut
  are near the top.  It is hard to say who is first.  It is also difficult to
  distinguish between inspired and original thought.  Since it isn't clear to
  me that any thought based on perceptions of the world of humanity can be
  wholly one's own, the distinction may be academic.  We all build on what
  came before.  Though it may all have been said before, it needs to be said
  again and again and again.

				  Disclaimer
  The characters and events in this book are fictional.



					 "Victor's Denial"
					 or "The Y2kaveman"

					  "What is it All About?"
   It is about a greedy minority looting our Planet (our reality) in general
and our economy (our abstraction) in particular.  The seemingly eternal game
is played across the racial/ethnic spectrum by a small percentage of us all.
The rest of us are complicit in the sin by our cooperation and submission to
the elite who exploit us.
   It is about the delusion that we are just like them and would do the same
given the chance; about the belief that we are only jealous of their condign
superiority.
   It is about them filling their pockets at our expense and ignoring the
consequences to the Planet and to us.
   It's about people, victims of downsizing and the "service economy", either
struggling miserably to hang on or letting go and dying defeated and homeless.
   It is about the real consequences of greed; whether anyone intended them
or not; whether anyone notices or not.
   Ultimately, it is about: who's side are you on?!

   If you choose them, their consequences will be your reward.

						 Foreword
   I haven't had much luck getting through on this path but I'm trying
again.  Somehow I'm not surprised.  Human Resource Departments lose my
resumes and don't find them until after close dates.  Clerks and other
minor servo-mechanisms are programmed to not see me at all.  Homeless people
present a problem to be eliminated. Many people, in their literal minded
simplicity, take this trite observation to a place I'd rather not go.
It feels as if many have decided that since people disappear from society
when their unemployment insurance expires, that the disappeared should not
be seen or heard.  We give the place a bad image.  It's so easy, given modern
media, to alter the history, knowledge, emotions and thoughts of the average
citizen that the process I refered to isn't even noticed.  A few of us
recognized it in the sixties and after comparing it to Orwell's 1984, we were
laughed into oblivion.  A conditioned response I wasn't prepared for.  But
P.T. Barnum, I believe, said, aside from "there's a sucker born every minute",
something to the effect that you can't go wrong under estimating the general
public.  Or was that William Randolph Hearst when boasting he could get US
into a war with Spain (1898).
									  Tucson, late 1997

   Many seem to have forgotten but Victor remembers,
   "The Sabbath is made for Man". The System is good to the extent it helps
   us to survive. We cooperate in order to live.  We don't live in order to
   cooperate. The System is made for us.  We are not made for the System!
   
   The
   Ascetic,  Chapter 10

   Flat cars, box cars, ore cars, car cars
   Empty or full of our past and future
   Going South.
   Empty or full of our bleak future,
   Coming up!

   
   The
   Revelation,  Chapter 20

   I know something is wrong but what is it?
   Steady, if you jump to conclusions, you'll just look foolish.
   Whoa! Wait!...
   Oh well, he did have potential.

   
   The
   Dreamer  Chapter 50


   Jesus is Wonderful!" Yet, if He'd been merely a
   man and worked no miracles and still lived and taught a life
   of compassion and joy And others had followed the example of
   the man (as we Have not followed the example of the Son of
   God), then He would have been so much more wonderful!
   
   Setting Aside
   
   Religion  Chapter 60

					"Hustled"
   They pass by blurred by a prophylaxis of time.
   Encapsulated within the shell they are protected
   From the Random importunities of the superfluous.  With
   Unceasing urgency they seek their destinations.
   Hurry up and die!


   
   Seeing an 
   old friend.  Chapter 70

   Most of us are born under water.
   Our parents can't teach us to swim.
   Unless we can teach ourselves,
   We will use up our strength, then drown.
   
   Working the 
   System  Chapter 80

   The Tower of 
   Babel Chapter 100

   Top to bottom, right to left,
   Filled in by others is the best.
   You think too much!
   Just do as I say.

   
   Maintaining 
   Contact, Chapter 150

   "If you wish to see it before your eyes, have no
   Fixed notions either for or against it." The third Patriarch of Zen

   
   The "Original Sin" 
   Connection, Chapter 160

   "The Great Way is no harder than men themselves
   Make it by not refusing to prefer;
   For where there is no abhorrence, where there is no
   Frenzy to have, the Way lies manifest." The third Patriarch of Zen

   
   Economic 
   Compassion, Chapter 170

   It is a discipline, a mastery of your mind.
   It is a Practice.  Attend to what you are doing.

   
   Personal 
   Compassion, Chapter 180

   When there is nothing to do, do nothing.
   When there is something to do, focus all
   Your attention and power on doing it.


   
   A chance to 
   teach. Chapter 190

   With homage to J.J. and Willie S.  How be't,
   By what vicarious route of circumlocution
   Cometh it to you, to make known to me the
   Inclination of common superiors towards me?

   
   Endless 
   repitition. Chapter 200


   "Yet I will try the last.  Before my body
    I throw my warlike shield.  Lay on, Macduff,
    And damn'd be him that first cries, 'Hold, enough!'"
    [Macbeth: Act V, Scene VIII]



   Endless 
   repitition. Chapter 210


		  Elementary Academy
   And, on the lofty height to which you
   Are elevated, through your baroque effort of assumption
   And by the assistance of those who rose before,

   Build a bastion of beauty
   By which the world corresponds to your thought.
   Believe, as you must, the unsuitability of those creatures

   Cavorting beneath, corraled within the chaste
   Civility of your aspirant rumination, to be seen
   Come, as if they could, to see as you are.




   Victor thinks about many things.


   He likes to eat too! If you contact me:

	 Greg Kaiser
	 PO box 22935
	 agkaiser1@gmail,com

   I'll feed Victor so he can continue to think about things.  They'll also
   be written and published for your further amusement.

					    A G Kaiser


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