Once upon a time, people crafted
everything they needed with their own hands. They relied on each other for what
they couldn’t do or make themselves. This was called community. They had
community with the earth that sustained them and each other.
To ease their labor, they improved
their technology. They tasted leisure and wanted more. Others saw that profit
could be had from this desire for leisure. Technology, the earth and people were
then diverted to make machines and to make things, rather than husbanded
equitably to provide for all.
People left their crafting for what
became known as work to make money to buy the things no one knew how to make
anymore. People were unable to feed and clothe themselves. They did not
know how to make water or heat. Because people unlearned how to heal themselves, they
feared and hated death.
Because they relied on things, their hearts forgot the
meaning of community and they became attached instead to things. Their
impotence created a hunger for more, a fear of losing things. Their
appetite was as insatiable as their dissatisfaction. Thus community became enslaved, sacrificed, burned, upturned to produce things.
Because it was too painful to
reckon with their impotence, too painful to reckon with their appetite, too painful to reckon with their
wreckage, they devised rituals to atone. Each week, they separated
recycling from trash. The more zealous ones, further separated materials into
compost and glass. The most pious offered their electronic offal, their electric
detritus at designated shrines. Still others poured what was no
longer useful into trash bags for the poor and needy.
