i love being a part of a BLOGline community.

i'm going to bogota, the humble capitol of colombia, the week after next. it's fucking holy week. i'm a bit nervous about it because my girlfriend can't come with me, and i'm not sure if anyone's going to actually, so it might just be me against the city.

but hopefully not me against the FARQ.

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this past weekend someone walked up to me with a rock in their hand and just said "un dolar". with a bad-assed face. i told him i didn't have a dollar, i had more than i dollar, i wondered what the hell he was planning on doing with the rock, there was no one around, i gave him 35 cents.

we met going different ways, but when we parted, he started following me. i noticed this. i went into the bus stop and he didn't follow me, i had to pay 25 cents to go into the bus stop, but i could see out of the corner of my eye he was looking at me, then an undistinguishable hand gesture.

i was kind of nervous and afraid. sometimes i don't mind being a coward in this way, because i know in other ways i'm not. but i think you could understand i get kinda nervous at the intersection of money demands and potential assault.

what is it with me and blacks, anyway? yeah, i should probably make some friends with blacks so i don't have to stereotype them, but 66% of blacks i have encounters with on the street really don't seem to help any public relations cause.

yeah, that's kinda racist.

it's just that how can racism feel so right when it's so wrong?

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the other day i had a thought about being tired of the ivory tower, because before i thought i was doing myself a justice becoming aware of alot of things that have taken place in space and time, somehow drawing closer to the well of experience of humanity in a way, making half-assed theses up about stuff 90% of people don't know about or probably wouldn't care about, drawing closer to something...not eternal, but..i'm not sure of the adjective i'm looking for.

in any case, i thought, well, no, my experience is one that has been far more rare in the history of humanity (although it's becoming less and less), to be fairly educated and to have much more than enough, etc., to know things luxouriously.

and i thought that perhaps that hum of humanity, that constant drone, it may be, is heard loudest through the experience/s of the "common" man, as he's called, although i think that's a bit pejorative.

the working man? spanish expresses it better, i'm talking about a "sentido popular", a popular feeling, a popular meaning, popular referring to people, that mass, rather than the more modern definition we've given to popular as a current trend. or something. far more people have experienced life through eyes we call "ignorant". so why not try and connect with that, in a way?

but unfortunately i've been stained with education.

so that's why i kind of think all those people who give their money to televangelists, etc., i don't know. i wouldn't be so hard on them. because we all try to find some way to numb our pain, maybe they're just not as conscious of the fact that that's what they're doing.

we all need an opiate. mine's smoking cigarettes and drinking beer and drinking caffeine and having orgasms and watching movies and listening to music and being in love. those are my doors. and herbs when they're around.

and just because i'm conscious of them doesn't make me any better, though, does it?

but hell, if the rapture does happen soon i'll be on the first plane back to GR to burn timothy lahaye novels.

and have sex with you.