“Lost in thought I sat on the deck barge, struggling to find the elementary and universal conception of the ethical which I had not discovered in any philosophy. Sheet after sheet I covered with disconnected sentences, merely to keep myself concentrated on the problem. Late on the third day, at the very moment when, at sunset, we were making our way through a herd of hippopontamuses, there flashed upon my mind, unforeseen and unsought, the phrase ‘Reverence for Life.’ The iron door had yielded: the path in the thicket had become visible…Now I knew that the world-view of ethical world and life affirmation, together with its ideals of civilization, is founded in thought.” Albert Schweitzer, Out of My Life and Thought

“Sometimes I wonder if I would be better off in a small town with a nice house and shit. Then I see pictures of people on Facebook living that life and I think, ‘No thanks!'”
Anonymous, Life Cafe, Brooklyn, New York

Should I be living my life this way?
We have lost ourselves in the coulds and shoulds.
Asking distracts from what is, and we become irritable with the present.
This moment is a culmination of what has happened at the intersection of what will.
Should I be an artist?
Art, in its purity, is not something one should or should not do. It is creation coming from everything that is presently you. Everything else is immitation or failed attempts.

It was a Thursday. The sun broke the horizon at 5:03 am. The sky was clear and bright by seven. The westerly wind outside the Marlborough Hospital was blowing at a calm 8 miles per hour. It was a breeze that could go unnoticed. I would be in the world by 7:28 am.
The doctor in charge was 38-year-old Bahy N. Louca, an Arab immigrant having graduated from Alexandria University, Egypt, twelve years before he was to bring me into this world. He would pass away four days before my 27th birthday. Allah Yarhamak Dr. Louca.
By noon the temperature would reach high 70s. People would be talking about how the Red Sox lost the night before to the Indians 5-7. In the evening the Jewish in town would sit down to eat matzah to celebrate the second Seder of Passover, a recognition of the flight of the Hebrews from Egypt.
Jimmy Carter was running around the country trying to convince voters he should be the next president over incumbent Gerald Ford, who was the first to enter such a position after the resignation of the nortorious Nixon. By November Carter succeeded. Trust of government was thin. Vietnam just ended poorly and the economy had hit the lowest point since the Great Depression.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest took five Oscars including Best Film and Best Actor, Jack Nicholson.
The cover story in Newsweek reads “How Safe is Nuclear Energy?” A Chrysler advertisement claims, “Chrysler Sales Have Nearly Doubled. Proof That America Still Cares About Excellence.”
Marlboro Man was selling cigarettes from Marlboro Country and you could smoke on planes and in public buildings.
The People’s Republic of China was forming, Lebanon was breaking out into a civil war, and rumors of Israel aquiring nuclear weapons were spreading.
What was life like the day I was born? This was the question I contemplated. If anyone knows anything more about what it felt like to be alive on April 15, 1976 please share. I really can’t remember.