Content 18+
I am blessed by the fact that my students and other friends are always sending me interesting things to read. One I got recently was an excellent article by a writer I hadn’t heard of named Cody Delistraty on the theme of what he termed the “relentless, competitive” quest for ‘Happiness” and how people today often make themselves miserable trying to obtain it.
I use the word “obtain” … Read the rest
(The eye, altering, alters all) -- William Blake
Content 16+
One of my more engaging and creative young Chinese students (a girl of 13 years) recently started an essay with the following title: ‘Imagine that you are someone’s shadow for a day.’ In the first paragraph, she asks, “Can you choose whose shadow are you or would you just come into existence when someone is born or when the person … Read the rest
Content 18+ I went out on the balcony, and suddenly I saw that stars are visible here… for me, being born in a small town squeezed between the sandy desert and steppe vastness fuelled by oil underneath, the view of the night sky full of stars was something common and familiar. I used to dream of them, trying to guess if there is a life out there. Soon after my … Read the rest
Content 21+ Come closer, my dear friend. Take a seat in this comfortable chair. Tell me how hard it was for you to study for eight hours per day at school, how your classmates bullied you, how you were underestimated at the university and get your €1500/month underpaid job, and why it is the reason you hate others (and those nasty immigrants, of course). I will, in turn, tell how … Read the rest
Content 18+ I can remember my undergraduate days more than a half century ago and sitting with friends until the wee hours having philosophical discussions about things like 'God'. The memory grows fuzzy, but it seems to me that we gave God at least a 50-50 chance of existing. Maybe, mixed in with the residue of an upbringing that took the reality of Heaven and Hell for granted, we were … Read the rest
Content 21+ Mercifully, I live in Europe so I am spared — aside from what I masochistically choose to read on the various sites — the usual avalanche of American nonsense about the Christmas Holidays — and yes, I continue to refer to them pointedly as such: The Christmas Holidays.
Thanksgiving has just finished and I feel safe in imagining that millions of American people celebrated joyously in the customary … Read the rest
Content 18+ Once there was a man, and there was a s…sorry, employee. It was something I would call an ordinary relation based on power, even though it all began with sweets and roses.
Come closer. I am going to tell you the story which lies beyond the boss-clerk relations, the story that eventually leads to life-changing events. Probably, our hero should be grateful to this man, after all. … Read the rest
