When I started writing my blog, (six years of Sundays…damn!), I had this overly optimistic, (pronounced de-ranged), notion that if I tossed an idea or two or three-hundred-twelve out into the cyber ocean, that, message-in-a-bottle-like, it/they might one day be discovered by some faraway seeker of enlightenment and, depending on his or her number of FaceBook® friends and Twitter followers, those issues that I found compelling or nettling or in need of further consideration, could, perhaps, make an impacting, positive dent, at the very least, or, be the spark that ignites the flame that unites and saves the world.  I realize my approach falls a bit short of say Gandhi forsaking all materialistic trappings to drive home his point, or MLK’s non-violent war against discrimination, or Mother Teresa’s tireless dedication, or Nelson Mandella’s or Aung San Suu Kyi’s selfless sacrifice.  It’s not that my passions for peace and fairness and human kindness don’t run to my very core, although I freely admit that there’s a level of commitment, (not unlike that first leap into a very cold pool), to which I have not yet fully…uh…committed.  Also, with the benefit of hindsight and selectively manipulated history, the “win” for these brave humanitarians, (the best the world had to offer), in every case, would have to be accompanied by a disclaimer such as Rome wasn’t built in a day, or you’ve got to walk before you can run, or you can lead a horse to water...  India remains a cesspool of poverty and inequality, certainly no better than the era of British rule.  Racial injustice and inequality in the US, for all its forward movement, is alive, flourishing and, if anything, backsliding.  The good deeds of Mother Teresa and the legacy of relieving human suffering that she has left behind can only be measured microscopically.  Being black in South Africa is better than during the years of apartheid, but mostly, it still sucks as does being almost anyone who is not one of the handful of power elite in Myanmar.  In my mind’s eye, I view myself as fundamentally altruistic, yet, in the light of the impact of these monumental icons of selflessness, mustering the motivation to go ‘all in’, comes with the heavily pessimistic weight of creeping insignificance.  Besides, it’s too easy to become distracted.  One minute we’re all, “let’s degrade and defeat ISIS, the greatest terrorist threat facing the world today.”  Then up pops Khorasan, which is, we’re now told, even worse, and all of this war-y stuff has distracted us from, well, everything else.  Which I fully understand, because I’ve been watching Ken Burns’ Roosevelts doc, a fourteen-hour commitment to learning about their altruism while putting my own, (at least for the fourteen required hours of viewing), on hold.  And the iPhone 6 came out and there was the dilemma of 6 or 6+ and choice of storage capacity and color…all distracting and time consuming.  I should probably do better, but even the self-flagellation involved with that mindset is…a distraction.