Homeless in Paris Homeless in Paris | Page 236

B"H We can keep a journal written in that tenor; listen, and attend to our inner thoughts, and arrange our verbal articulation to a leve l that makes our words acceptable . In this literary treatise, the notion of love can be either altruist or utilitarian; life is love of silence achieved whe n motion completes its course . The giving is spiritual but the media of presentation has every aspect of actuality. As the sphere of influences upon which the elderly ha ve acted are being reduced, so too, his need for the skills of survival are lessened. He might not have to eke out his living with the cunning of a fox anymore, but that depends on the root syste m in his society. When younger generations reject the value of the bark and hack away at the trunk or fail to replenish the soil or allow light to reach the leaves, deforestation results. Where the flow o f minerals is conducted naturally from the core (xylem and phloe m) to the outer spheres of cellular substance the tree exists like forever. Trees improve their multiplicity of decades as concerns their functional longevity by bearing forth offspring . People see the disappearance of their spirit fro m amongst the living as a tragic inevitability that they despise, fear, and endeavor to avoid; this confusion is typical of occidental beings . People are stupid for trying to apprehend the configuration o f their being dead, it is a realm of experiential occurrence that cannot be measured by perceptible dimensions, and their confusion usurped by "eternity salesmen." For example, the slogan, "Live and be merry for tomorrow we die," you'd be surprised to know how mostly Occidental people subscribe to that philosophy. When the old people accept the inevitability o f death they can arrange to depart on the journey that entails only restfulness and no productivity, a world where sounds are not important and no sights can dist ract us from the area under discussion. There is no train schedule and no more hurrying about, I exist as the diminution and significance of my interaction with those around me, no cleaving unto the status quo where I no longer exist for them, only memories, so make them good. To posture oneself correctly with regard to the configuratio n of beco ming dead, practical restraint and quietude are virtues o f old age. Basic needs are treated with simple significance; we may react modestly to the imposition of the physiologica l alterations and restrictions on our bodies as natura l 236