Spraypaint masquerade

The Holy Bible talks early on about gold. If the Bible is fake, it is still interesting to read that gold has been dominating our lives and mental health for a few millennium at the least. The Bible talks about gold and a couple other things I don’t know about: bdellium and onyx (not the Pokemon).

Is God giving us the currency that will rule the world early on? Doubt it. This gold though seems pretty special and unique, even in the ancient days. Years ago I was talking to my buddy Neil. Neil is a doctor. The philosophizing doctor, not the medicalizing type. Anyways, Neil and I got to talking about the stock market. Neil told me all about the mysterious gold standard, printers of money, etcetera. Jewelry has never made much sense to me. I’ve never wanted to stab my ears or wear a scantly choking hazard. Me and Neil got in the thick of it. T-h-i-c-k-thick. Not t-h-i-c-c. Anyways, Neil and I got in the thick of it. Neil told me gold is everywhere because people have phones everywhere. Neil told me that gold helps in the space race to the mini-computers we have in our pockets. I asked Neil, “If gold is so precious then why do we waste it on ourselves.” Neil wants his own little golden-prize, so he didn’t give me much of an answer. 

Gold turns out to be pretty useful stuff though. Malleable since the earliest of documented days. A precious metal that was sought after because of its dense, shiny, soft, malleable properties. Gold is also in our bodies and an excellent source of conductivity. 

It makes sense to me why gold is so sought after. It was probably an early tool. If I think about it on a granular level, and imagine being some ancient person doing ancient things like beating a rock and such. I could use it’s malleable-soft properties to form something—anything—to help me eat, I probably would. Some of the earliest documented records of gold though are during the reign of the the Pharaohs. The earliest Egyptians were as fascinated with choking hazards and bling-bling long before Hollywood started giving out little Egyptian statues for a job well acted. That still befuddles me when I really think about it. There are whole award shows and fancy carpets rolled out for a bunch of people who can act like other people. I think my boss deserves a little gold-statue too. He always acts like he cares about us and we are a family when his stake is on the line. My cousin died a while back, so I asked for the day off to go to the funeral and my boss told me, in his holier then-thou voice, “immediate relatives, and grandparents only” qualify for a bereavement day and to take it up with HR if I had other questions. I had other questions. So I asked human resources if they could be humane and resourceful and allow me to go pay respects to my dead cousin. The policy is airtight, is pretty much all I got back. I went to the funeral anyway and just called in sick. The joke was on me though. I got sick the next week and couldn’t afford to take the time off.

Then the LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper *suitable for him.” And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. And the man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. So the LORD God caused a deep sleep too fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh at that place. And the LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. And the man said, “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. (18-25)

Even my cat knows it is not good for me to be alone. He has no qualms about invading my laptop space while I try to make sense of the Holy Bible in my life. Human connection is pretty unique when I think about it. I like to watch YouTube videos of scientists explaining consciousness. Each one has a different version of consciousness and human emotion and they all look like Charlie day from that conspiracy meme. I remember this kid back in middle-school that would do anything for attention too. He could spin some stories. Roger would tell me all about how his dad did this and his dad did that. It wasn’t until after I graduated high school I found out that Roger’s dad was bludgeoned to death in El Salvador before he was born. My cat’s mom died in a construction accident years ago. I wonder if he consciously grieves his trauma everyday too

Thinking about all these living cells, electrons, neutrinos, mitochondria, and E equals MC squared type of stuff, God so far aligns with my barebones logic. Aren’t humans sixty-five’ish percent water? God watering man to life sounds so elegant. Probably a little too poetic for the modern philosophizers. I get it though, because as a human we have a need to label and understand everything. 

I keep reading on the intra-web: If God is real, then why does he allow pain and suffering?  This question is a very fair question. If God didn’t allow pain and suffering, wouldn’t that lead us to a unicorn utopia of bliss? Is that what free-will is? The right to accelerate when seeing the yellow light, or yield and slow-down? If God is so perfect, then why does he need us to worship Him anyway? I remember hearing that song as a little-tike, “If God was one of us” and maybe God is just an influencer of good-will that wants his own “likes” and upvotes well.