“Things are not always what they seem; the first appearance deceives many; the intelligence of a few perceives what has been carefully hidden.” -
– The Phaedrus, written by Plato
Creepy Optical Illusion by ~cchasecal on deviantART
not so many years ago,, i was working as a waitress in a small, family owned, diner style, restaurant. living in a tiny basement studio,, and squandering my meager income on frivolities like food and basic utilities.. at that precise moment in history, the country in which i live, was spinning like a brightly colored child’s top, giddy with delusions of grandeur made possible by the boom in the housing market, the introduction of sub prime loans, the staggering rate at which property values were soaring..
meanwhile,, i was standing there,, in a dirty apron,, coffee pots hanging off both my thumbs saying.. ” i give it five years,, and this whole thing will implode.. the market will be flooded with foreclosures, displaced families, bankruptcies, and as a result an explosion of homeless people,, (many of them the the same young families and greedy investors that were here in being blinded by the possibility of finally being able to ace what we have been raised to believe was, “the american dream….” ) that we are in no way equipped to care for, will be flooding our streets and overburdening our social service institutions..”
i cannot tell you how many times, since then, i have stated, either aloud in conversation, or in private to myself,, “how come i,, a lowly diner waitress,, with barely a high school education was able to see that??” “how is it that the financiers, bankers, economists, politicians, government officials,, people we would ordinarily expect to be able to ‘foresee’ our financial futures, not only allowed something like that to happen,, but in many cases jumped on the soon to be sinking bandwagon themselves??”
the only answer i can, to date come up with, is that i was not in a position to glean any of the purposed riches that would surely follow closely on the shirttails of such a windfall of real estate investments.. i was not blinded by the possibilities.. my situation left no room for the entertainment of such delusions of grandeur and thus my field of vision was impossible to misdirect..
on several occasions over the course of my maintaining this blog,, i have written in both my poetry and my prose about the misdirection of focus i see going on… ( homeless, distraction, food fight, sleight of hand, “sustain me!”) so, why am i still so amazed that when these illusions are pointed out,, that the majority of people will,, much like cattle being led to the slaughter,, rally to the defense of that which has been purposely put in place to delude them,, in lieu of pulling back the blinders and having another look??
i am not a person given to unfounded feelings of paranoia.. i do not prescribe to any vastly ornate conspiracy theories… i am not a believer in evil forces, manchurian candidates, or things that go bump in the night… i am far from highly educated,, and not even as creative as some of you might like to think… but for some reason, one that remains devastatingly outside of my own control, i am blessed with being able to see what is going on right in front of me..
my fascination with pointing things out to you as i see them,, is in no way driven by a desire to convert you to my way of thinking.. i don’t even have a way of thinking to convert to.. rather my objective is to plant the seed of discovery.. to get you to question what you do see.. to point you in a direction that might allow you to become willing to see, that which has been put in place solely to misdirect you from that which you should not be seeing.. and to wonder,, if only over the course of this one day, if what you are focusing on is whats really important,, or have you thru no real fault of your own,, been misdirected….
