[PenultimateManStanding]

I'm 52 now so that was a long time ago. I recall that I had it all together then. The girlfriend, the envy of peers. By the time I was 18 I was confused and lost. Drugs and pot left me that way. There is a lot to be said about this kind of introspection. We should all do it. When I reached 19 I got into meditation and quit doing what NEOPO finds so grand. I joined the Community College swimming team and conditioned my body. I got A's in my courses. Kahlil Gibran was a good influence. Mozart too. But there is so much in this world to destroy a youth. There is so much to destroy a soul. Then comes the adult world, it's even worse. I mentioned that I don't like 15 year olds. They are better than adults. Maybe this is why I gravitate to a forum like this. Maybe we all gravitate to an "end of the world" forum because we hate this world. So it seems pretty cool, huh, no more cheap energy, no more smug adults who think they know what's going on. Mother Nature slaps their silly asses. I'm with you holmes.

[KhanCEO]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'M')aybe this is why I gravitate to a forum like this. Maybe we all gravitate to an "end of the world" forum because we hate this world. So it seems pretty cool, huh, no more cheap energy, no more smug adults who think they know what's going on.

[PenultimateManStanding]

Yes, I agree, some people just found out about it in spite of it all. No hatred of the world. But my impression is that most POilers hate this world and they will be glad to see it change and come to some kind of end.

[Zardoz]

When I was sixteen we were troubled by one thing: The threat of nuclear war between the US and the Soviet Union.

Beyond that, all any of us knew was that the future was bright. We believed in tomorrow. We were sure everything about life would be better. We were convinced that there were no limits to where the "march of progress" would take us. We had no idea of how the global population would grow, and what it would mean. We were blissfully ignorant.

Life was good.

[robski]

I first discovered peak oil when I was researching this website:

http://survive2012.com/

...so I probably don't have to say much more. I had some pre-existing and strange ideas about the fate of the World. Peak Oil just kind threw a chunk of reality my way. 2012 is still a nice theory though, isn't it? Those crazy Mayans...

[perdition79]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KhanCEO', 'I') personally hate Peak Oil. It totally screwed up my plans in life. The only reason why I found out about it was because I was determined to find out how the world works in every possible aspect so I could exploit the information to make myself rich. I have warned my friends and family but they all think I'm nuts. I'm 21 years old with college credits, I dropped out of community college because having a degree in criminal justice is uesless when there is not enough energy for me to feed myself. Thats my story and thoughts about all of this. I WISH I WAS WRONG, BUT IM TOO WELL RESEARCHED.

[lotrfan55345]

uh uh
it's nice being born in the early-mid 90's

[Aaron]

When I was seventeen
It was a very good year
It was a very good year for small town girls
And soft summer nights
Wed hide from the lights
On the village green
When I was seventeen

When I was twenty-one
It was a very good year
It was a very good year for city girls
Who lived up the stair
With all that perfumed hair
And it came undone
When I was twenty-one

When I was thirty-five
It was a very good year
It was a very good year for blue-blooded girls
Of independent means
We'd ride in limousines
Their chauffeurs would drive
When I was thirty-five

But now the days grow short
Im in the autumn of the year
And now I think of my life as vintage wine
>from fine old kegs
>from the brim to the dregs
And it poured sweet and clear
It was a very good year

It was a mess of good years

-------------------------------------

Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

[eastbay]

PMS I too am 52. Although we differ now and then, it seems we have similar understanding and humor in so many things. I knew about PO when I was 19 then forgot alla bout it.

And the re-discovery a few years ago resulted in a HUGE shift in my thinking, lifestyle, and life course.

It seems like I'm always thinking on some level about planning for it. I'll never be completely ready but moreso now by far than just a few years ago, that's for sure.

[DesertBear2]

I am 53. At that time, the feud between the US and USSR govts was in high gear and the Minuteman nukes were being deployed. My own feeling was that I am not going to let the psychotics who were playing this ultimate power game destroy all that is good on the earth. So planning was in order.

After the collapse of the USSR, it looked like clear sailing toward a better world. The information revolution was in full swing and had the potential to breach national and cultural divides.....maybe even make national borders obsolete.......

But no. The post 1989 dreams have not been realized. And peak oil has appeared.

[gego]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', ' ')Maybe this is why I gravitate to a forum like this. Maybe we all gravitate to an "end of the world" forum because we hate this world.

[gego]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', '
')Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

[Carlhole]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'I')'m 52 now so that was a long time ago. I recall that I had it all together then. The girlfriend, the envy of peers. By the time I was 18 I was confused and lost. Drugs and pot left me that way. There is a lot to be said about this kind of introspection. We should all do it. When I reached 19 I got into meditation and quit doing what NEOPO finds so grand. I joined the Community College swimming team and conditioned my body. I got A's in my courses. Kahlil Gibran was a good influence. Mozart too. But there is so much in this world to destroy a youth. There is so much to destroy a soul. Then comes the adult world, it's even worse. I mentioned that I don't like 15 year olds. They are better than adults. Maybe this is why I gravitate to a forum like this. Maybe we all gravitate to an "end of the world" forum because we hate this world. So it seems pretty cool, huh, no more cheap energy, no more smug adults who think they know what's going on. Mother Nature slaps their silly asses. I'm with you holmes.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Carlhole', '
')Hey PMS (off the subject)

Do you like good writing?

[lateStarter]

When I was 16, I was running 10-15 miles per day, smoking the stuff like there was no tomorrow, and screwing everything I could get my hands on (with a cute face and long legs) - hey, it is good to have some sort of selective criteria, right? For Miki - she had to have 'the eyes', if you know what I mean...

My parents had no idea what was going on downstairs in my room. All they knew was that they had a straight-A student, captain of the X-Country team, heading for UVA on a scholarship.... Granted, all that was many years ago...

Bottom line. There were many of us that should have been thinking about the future, but all we were thinking about was getting laid. We were and are not evil, just programmed for short term thinking = immediate gratification..

No excuse, but how many of you at 16-20 were thinking at the time: what will this world be like when I am 40 or 50? On the other hand, I realize that we have some young folks here that are acutely aware of the situation that we are in now and are not happy about it..

[Carlhole]

Well, in the case of "The Devils", I'm not a "devils" advocate, I'm afraid. I picked up the book a couple of years ago because it supposedly anticipated the Bolsheviks by 60 years, and I was looking for some comparison to our own Neocons, who, to me, are like devils - and besides, it was Doestoevsky! and guaranteed to expand my mind, right?

It didn't. It read sort of like a tired old soap opera. In fact, it was published originally in serial form in a newspaper. And it was immensely popular in Russia amongst the masses. I believe D was simply catering to his plebian audience' tastes and making some money which his publisher was always urging him to do (actually, the story of Doestoevsky's promises, betrayals and other shenanigans with his publisher would be a good story in itself). I managed to get half way through it before I chucked it down as poppycock.

The only other D I've read is "Crime and Punishment" which was better, I thought. I really liked the first part of the novel in that it was a study of a student's psychological deterioration after the commital of a horrid crime. But the ending wasn't as satisfying as the beginning, I thought. It sort of had a uncharacteristic happy ending. One expects harsh truth and bitter reality from the Russian mind.

Doestoevsky's actual life is an interesting story. I haven't read a biography but I bet I would enjoy it more than the author himself. He had been imprisoned in Siberia for a decade or so and it had a tremendous effect on him.

So, read "The Devils" and tell me what you think. I probably don't completely understand Doestoevsky like an academic would. If it consoles you, I didn't like Joseph Conrad's "Under Western Eyes" either, in which he tries to mimic Doestoevsky's art, an art which was always so talked about in intellectual circles well into the 20th century.

But I HAVE read alot of Tolstoy who is sort of comparable to Conrad. Tolstoy really shines, in my opinion, in his vivid descriptions of Russian military campaigns - the encampments, the uniforms, the soldier's habits, personalities, the weather and landscape, the odor of everything, the Muslim (usually) enemy, everything is brilliantly described.

I read "War and Peace" after reading alot of his earlier and shorter stuff which academicians say were prelude and preparation for his large, long works. But I enjoyed the earlier tales more, I think. War and Peace also read like a long, long soap opera. It might be part of a Russian taste in literature, at least in the 19th century. After reading it, I immediately knew from whence Herman Wouk's "The Winds of War" had sprung.

Personally, I like to read for the elegance of language. and that's why I like Conrad so much. Tolstoy for the same reason yet less so.

You might be able to find Conrad's "Tales of Unrest" somehere for a quarter also. It's a collection of 6 novellas which are all completely different in setting and subject. In elegance of language, I think they were the zenith of Conrad's talent for imagery, although I've never heard of anyone else say that.

[PenultimateManStanding]

I don't mind serial novels of the 19th century that appealed to popular tastes. Eugene Sue's The Wandering Jew was one of those, and sure, it had that "soap opera" quality. But I liked it. The popular imagination was more elevated then than it is now. Probably because they didn't have television and movies.

[Carlhole]

At the site I mentioned...

www.dailylit.com/find.php?authors=D-E

They have Doestoevsky's 'Crime and Punishment', 'Notes From the Underground' and 'The Idiot'. So maybe I'll try 'Notes..." just to see what it is.

Let me know what you think of 'The Devils'.

[Aaron]

Ok,

It was 1981.

Girls had big hair & wore leg warmers.

Mel Brooks made History of the World: Part I, and MTV taught us who A Flock of Seagulls were.

Ronald Reagan was our GWB, & we put Sandra O'Conner on the Supreme Court.

A jerkwad shot the Pope.
Iran held some Americans hostage.

Spielberg brought us Indiana Jones, & Bill Murrey starred in Stripes.

AIDS...

It was an eventful year.... got my first car.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', '
')It was an eventful year.... got my first car.