The God Factor...and Matrix Obssessions.

Great e-mail. I should explain here that I actually DO believe in a grand design(er) of some kind. I've experienced too many amazing things for life and the universe for everything to be merely arbitrary. There IS something UP there/around us. That much I FEEL.(I don't want to be presumptuous and say "know"...) I guess my problem with the Sunday School feelgood optimists out there is the Christian Missionary factor: "Why languish in the darkness of ignorance when WE know what's best for you?" And therein lies the rub. As far as higher knowledge goes, I like to proceed from the standpoint that an individual or a group CAN'T POSSIBLY know The Answers, regardless of what good book it's printed in...The Bible, The Koran, what have you. The answers must be striven for deeper understanding. Or then again, it could be the most brilliant mass delusion that humanity has ever concocted for itself. Who knows for sure? Thanks for helping me to wake up with these ruminations. A good day to you, sir... ------------- Last night, we finally got the glitchy DVD player working properly and we finally go to see RAY, the biopic on Ray Charles. Powerful, inspiring stuff. I wonder why it tanked at the box office? Probably too much post-FARENHEIT 911 backwash? Who knows? I've been taking a page from Natalie Golberg's book WRITING DOWN THE BONES and throwing stuff down into a notebook every day, regardless of how badly written, clumsy, or subject matter. Like exercise, the more you write, the better you become. I'm still reading her book now...You should check it out. Her whole credo is: "Writing yourself sane." Forget about writing for publication. This is just about letting the voices out. I consider this different from a journal which is an account of the events that you experience in life. So far, so good... Saw the MATRIX Trilogy when Danny came over for a spell. I got a LOT more out of it but that third one just seemed to be relatively bankrupt of ideas, a great CHUNK of it was a fanboy's battle-tech wet-dream. Yeah, yeah...Zion gets attacked. What about the nature of reality? What kind of relationship do the Architect and the Oracle REALLY have? It's an amazing fully-realized world. (The ANIMATRIX goes into the background of the whole universe.) The ingenious thing about this whole universe IS, you can watch the movies, the Animatrix, read the comics, play the video games...They all contribute to a greater narrative whole. Plus, you get a cool super-hero battle scene at the end of REVOLUTIONS. Reminiscent of MiracleMan versus Kid MiracleMan in particular. Lots of rain, a fair amount of destruction. But then, the Wachowski Brothers are comics fans amongst other things. The original MATRIX was HEAVILY influenced by Grant Morrison's THE INVISIBLES as well as ANIME(a Japanese animation film-form that has become hugely popular in the States in recent years but does NOTHING for ME...) Except for Star-Blazers and Battle of the Planets, of course. (Amateur...) Anyway...Hope all is well...If this is an A320 trip, maybe I'll even run into you. Unlikely, but you never know... Take care of yourself, my good friend..