Maru Loves Lollipops

Originally Posted Sunday, February 23, 2014

Give people the little things that seem inconsequential but which are the stuff of a good life.  Don't make them live in shit.  When they ask for good roads, they aren't just asking for paving.  Line them with trees.  Keep them as traffic free as possible.  Don't build them to serve developers but to let people travel from one place to another without undue hardship.  And again--make them pretty.  Seems simple enough, right?  Give them centers to gather that are not strip malls, places with squares and small parks, lots of them so that every neighborhood has them.  Let the shops have beautiful wood framed windows and brass hardware and gold stencil.  Give them the things that make them desire to travel.  Make it look like an Irish country pub or a coffee shop in Vienna or an outdoor cafe in the Andes.  Let people feel good. 

Why the fuck not?

Cheap ass greed. 

O.K.  Maybe.  My mother likes Maxwell House coffee, so what can you do.  She went to Vienna, but she doesn't talk about it. 

I just read an article on the worst places to live in the U.S. based on "well-being" which is a conglomerate of indices you can read about here.  The worst places to live are pretty predicable, including Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and West Virginia.  Apparently the "fat index" weighed heavily in this.  And, for the most part, I think of those as "the hate" states.  Anger and frustration just can't be good for well-being. 

My point is, don't just give them "food."  Food is good, of course, but Jesus Christ General Mills, just make it food, not food stuff.  Make a culture of beauty.  Punish mean people and greed heads.  MAKE THE SEATS ON AIRLINES BIG ENOUGH! 

Etc. 

There once was a little girl in Greece (she is graduating from college now) who linked her blog to my old one.  I noticed that I would get visitors from her site and went over to have a look.  Oh, my, such girls charm me.  I wrote to her to thank her once, but she didn't respond.  The other day, I went to have a look for the first time in a year and read this:

"One of the shitty things about capitalism and even more of neoliberalism is the mess that becomes of time. You have no time to think, no time to rest, no time to love. It is a system incompatible with human rythms."

She has become wise.  This is well-stated, I think.  At least it knocked me down when I read it coming from such a fun and girly site.  The university has done its job, I'd say.  I think she must be a fascinating woman now.  I have fallen in love.  

Old Europe is being lost at a rapid pace, of course.  The Spanish government wants to end the afternoon siesta.  Spaniards are the least productive workers in Europe.  If Spain is to compete on the world market. . . . 

And so it goes.  Capitalists and Neoliberals are not fun.  Maru and her crowd are.  My neighbors are all rich capitalists and keep the neighborhood beautiful.  I wonder if they would do that if they made less money?