THE BRAVE NEW LAND

Tongue Waggin Sometimes I feel like I am being dragged uphill at such a breakneck speed that my self-awareness is being ripped off by wash-board bumps and boulders scattered across the pothole asphalt. Sometimes, I just wonder if I exist at all. I mean, what is happening in the world today? Everything's just 'so' upside down, everywhere…  We live in a world where gangsters are revered, peace keepers are shunned, royalty is destitute and hollow, evil dictators are 'shied' away from, the righteous are haughty, and the 'actual' poor are ignored. We live in a world where the next gadget is more important than the child that died making it. We live in a world where the rich and famous, the actors and the celebrities, all rant to the empty space between our ears from atop a soap-box about grandiose, self-promoting, and (oh-so) noble ideas — we seem to be living in a world that is trying to barf-up (hopelessly caught in a cycle of vapor-lock dry-heaves) the

The other night I awoke with a start, finding myself lying uncomfortably on an unknown park bench. It was in the wee hours of the morning and there were bottles strewn about. Two friends that I hadn't seen in years were sitting nearby, on an adjacent bench, but my mind was still wrapped in a dream that I had been having. I looked up at my friends and began to tell them about my dream. It didn't matter that I was on a bench, who knows where, who knows why, I needed to talk about it. The dream I had had was powerful and tapped the inner recesses of my soul. The dream started, simply enough, with me and my wife walking down a cobbled street, winding in and out between kiosks and restaurant seating someplace in Europe or maybe here in Israel. As our stroll progressed, I kept finding myself trapped by dead-ends, while my wife continued on ahead. I would be walking along with her and, all of a sudden, I would find railings separating us, forcing me to hop over in order to conti