What happens when the promised elixir (*) that has been touted for centuries as guaranteed to promote health, heal the wounds, cure disease, alleviate pain and prevent the noxious viruses from returning does not deliver on the hoped-for happy outcome? What is left for us to conclude when we observe the sick and infirm, the injured, the newly infected, bedridden souls, walking wounded, still vulnerable to the onslaught of malignant microbes? Has the original situation fundamentally changed? Do we delude ourselves by claiming progress? Are we to say, behold the amazing power of the elixir that only here and there, haphazardly and unpredictably works its magic? Because many have closed themselves off from the healing effects and thereby prove unworthy of a cure? Is that it? On the basis of such glaring evidence, could one not reasonably begin to question the purpose of the elixir itself? And if the elixir has not been working out as advertised, have we in fact misunderstood it?
I have spent much of my early life in the suburbs and after a brief stint in the big city - with its noise, crowding and cramped spaces, I find myself immersed again in this familiar realm - an environment that seems part of my destiny. I've always thoughts of the suburbs as a place meant for children - where children can feel safe and protected - with non-busy streets and clean sidewalks - room to ride one's bike or go door-to-door selling cookies. To consider how many of our early impressions and sensations were spawned by this largely artificial world...How different such a milieu is from other places on earth, war zones, rain forests, Siberian outposts, tiny mountaintop villages or large sprawling mazes of high rise apartments in vertically-inclined mega metropolises...The suburbs are a place where a definite order and routine can be imposed...where regularity is king... lawns get mowed on time, shrubs are trimmed, garbage bins are placed at the curb and returned to thei...
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