Any Idiot

Looking around over the last several years at television, movies, news headlines, and people generally, one could easily conclude that it's all hopeless.

Wars, bombings, and shootings; natural disasters that seem to come along like buses; a climate that seems to be taunting us with colder winters and hotter summers; political upheaval and gridlock, and above all, a sense of general malaise and incivility--a sense that humanity has given up.

It's all so BIG, so unfixable, seemingly so far out of our reach. As someone prone to what they used to call "melancholy," I've more than once thought that I must have been nuts to bring a couple of children into this ridiculous world and concluded that since I couldn't change any of it, my only choice was to ignore it all, hope for the best, and be well prepared to put my head between my legs and kiss my little arse goodbye.

Then oddly, I thought about the old quip about how you eat an elephant. You see, elephants are BIG. To look at one as an entree, you might conclude that it's un-eatable--out of your reach. But, as the old saw goes-- How do you eat an elephant? ONE BITE AT A TIME.

And it hit me--you change the world the same way. The reason the world doesn't seem to ever change for the better is that people conclude they can't eat the elephant before they've even taken the first bite.

So, this blog is my first bite. I'm embarking on an experiment to start changing the world through ridiculously small stuff that any idiot, including me, can do.

You can:

1) Watch in bemusement as the Universe hands me back my severed head;

2) Join in and get rid of this elephant faster; or

3) Put your head between your legs and....