Oh my dear tortured soul Maslow. My God, how I have forsaken you.

This entire time I thought you were just an old pathetic fool. Believing the world could be a better place, that we all are searching for something more, a higher ground to save us from the rising waters of our own isolation and fraility. I see now that I was wrong.

For you see, you and I have more in common then one would realize. Sure my mother wasn't as crazy as yours and I haven't any siblings. However, I am sure that you can understand the weight of my solitude as an only child for you too must have felt lost and alone amongst a family of seven children. Also, my dear friend Abraham, my father has also pushed me toward law (of which I am interested but cannot find the place to fit it into my life), I, just as you did, failed my first year at a community college and have rebounded with above average marks. We both have had a strong inferiority complex that drove us to succeed in physical endeavors which, after having given up, turned to books and a path towards academia. I understand now Maslow, you have made a believer out of me.

However, I am not a true convert to your humanistic approach! Nay, like a horse, nay I say! Though there are those out there who strive for self-actualization there are a hundred times more of those who simply wish to get by. People, for the most part, want to remain in a state of equilibrium. The majority is not like you or I. The majority does not wish to dispell thier vices, contemplate the depths of infinity, or question the nature of God. They are not philosophers; they are not mental warriors pursuing the intellectual holy grail. They are content to stay hidden in the cave, seeking refuse in it's pitch dark hollows.

So it is here that we must part ways Abraham. I will always keep in touch for you and I are brothers now.

A dialogue between several chums chumming over a glass of chumwater.

Soli H: Remember when we were all younger and we wanted to grow up so badly that we thought grown ups were lieing to us?

J Archer: No

Kurt B: I remember wanting to be older so much that I'd tried everything to appear older.

Soli: I know I thought I was just a different breed of the human race and that I'd never really grow up to be big and strong like those I admired as a youngster.

Anna O: I thought you made a good Nazi.

We all ignore Anna. She's a little wacked out of her mind and has had a little too much chumwater if you ask us.

Soli: Did we ever imagine that life would be so messed up once we finally got here? I know I didn't.

Kurt: Me neither. I mean as soon as you graduate from high school you're expected to just move to the next level with grace and profenciency.

J Archer: Then we struggle for four or five years balancing school, work, relationships. I mean that is more stress then we've ever had to handle. Then they act suprised when we fail and drop out!

Anna O leaves us to chit-chat with some young pup straight from infancy, that is, high school.

Soli: I remember thinking grown ups had it made 'cause they didn't have to go to school. Boy did I have it backwards.

J Archer: I always envied them, and I still do. Sure they work all day but so do I. Oh woopdeedoo you have car payments, housepayment, utility bills, taxes wah wah wah. So do I!

Kurt: No you don't. You still live with your parents and they pay for your car, your insurance, and...

J Archer: And what? My school? No sir, I pay for that. I get paid crap at my job and all of it goes into my next semester. When I can no longer pay for school I'll start taking loans. Don't think for a second that my parents will pay for that. Neither will the government. Damn the Expected Family Contribution!

Soli: Still, it breaks my heart to think that things could be any worse. I'm not speaking for (and or) of myself here.

Looking back at Anna O who is really laying the flirt down on the post-high school teenybopper

Soli (cont'): I'm just looking back in retrospect of all the people in this world that I know and all the emotional bullshit that we have to put up with and all the emotional bullshit that we push onto one another from day to day as a result of work related stress, taxes, bills, house details, car payments and more.

Kurt: Hear Hear!

Some noise catches our attention at the back of the pub. A lovers spat no doubt. The woman has her shoes off and is beating her boyfriend with the heel as the bouncer escorts them out.

Soli: I can see why people get stressed over somethings but why do so many of us snap at the ones we love the most? Easy targets maybe or is it because they love us that we feel they will be more understanding and not push us away as easily as someone else might?

J Archer: In the end, beyond the stressors of living and the battle to thrive in this demanding and heartless world, I believe that deep down we just want things to be simpler. We don't care about achieving an idealized sense of self. Instead, we just want to get by, from day to day, and to be with the ones we love. We snap on those we care about because it is really the world we wish, but cannot, attack.

Kurt: A projection defense?

J Archer: More of displacement really.

At this point we are joined by Kinsey T and Abedje K. Anna O and her new boyfriend stroll over seconds later. The 'Bobber pulling a chair over and Anna O taking a seat in his lap.

Soli: Welcome to the future one and all. Welcome to our years of suffering and substantial learnings of life that will mold us into who we wanted to be as youngster, may we live to be that strong admirable figure of wisdom in another youngsters life. To think all we need to do is endure pain, loss, grief and love. I'm ready. I hope you are too.

We all raise our chumwater high and toast to the future, regardless of how scary it might be.

How about, the time we pretended to go to the end of the world and watch the sky fall grey as the devistation of our lives krept past behind us and then we acted as if we didnt notice?

And then we thought we heard the crow caw, but it turned out to be an old man dying.

That old man was you.

Then, one man dying turned into two.

The second was me.

Two old crows,Dying and no one noticed that we were gone.

Then they found our words scratched deep into the bark of that old tree we once called home.

Our story will be told.