So, I'm moving, which is a whole other issue. Of course, there are a few things that the moving company just won't touch, and I seem to have in abundance. Fortunately, I have a 3/4 ton GMC van for Pennsic, which is how I'll be moving my "questionable" things.

The first load was ammo and the powder for reloading. Even with it all strapped down tight, knowing what was behind me made it a white knuckle ride. I found myself cornering more slowly, and braking more often to keep my speed down on hills. I became hyper-sensitive to my assured clear distance, and that of those who hovered behind me. Less than a week before, a very close friend totaled his truck in a pile up, and imagined scenarios involving the contents of my vehicle in just such a situation played out in my mind, with myriad precipitating circumstances, but only one outcome...

And like a magnet for other people's impending karmic balancing, I attracted some winners. As an example, I was followed, with about three to five feet of clearance, by some moron with about ten pounds of crap hanging from her rear view mirror. She kept swerving out to see if she could pass, then darting back just behind me. As she rode just a few feet away from several cans I did not want to be crushed, I thought hard about how such an oblivious sack of meat managed to come to dominate the Earth, even if for what likely promises to be a short spell. At last, we broke into a short stretch of four lane highway, for an interchange with another state route. And having a free and open lane, she did not pass me. And then she swerved out to check, and swerved right back behind me. And then, the road rejoined back down to two lanes.

At that point, I began to ponder about how often in life, we have no idea how closely we court death. In the mesmerizing dance that is life, changing partners as we swirl about, it might be wise to watch our footing. With a vapid gaze, fixed upon the next shallow social goal, thoughts focused upon the next shiny item we desire to possess, we propel ourselves without regard for anything but the momentary quelling of our shallow animal desires. Available to us, is the broad spectrum of history, balanced upon the back of eons of brutish struggle, with little enough opportunity. We have been granted, though no merit of our own, an awareness that it seems we prefer to brag about, rather than add to. And such narrow awareness, which we tout as a glorious pinnacle, is truthfully but a singular point along an extended gradation, made relevant only by our temporal limitations and frighteningly limited cosmic perspective. And yet, there are so many among us who choose not to avail themselves of the opportunity to participate in this great advancing curve.

The highway has opened back up into four lanes again for over a mile now, and she makes her mad dash, whipping back into the lane in front of me, and riding hard a few feet behind behind the next car. The passing lane is clear and open. I check my mirrors, and await my next dance with a ton or more of steel guided by the hand of a barely aware howling monkey, intent and focused on anything but the dance with death that awaits them, should they tangle their steps with mine in their self involvement.

Eleven more hours and an unanticipated rain storm in the mountains to go. Plenty of time to ponder further on the possible fate of my fellow man.