There are some who say all you need to survive is canned peas. I don’t necessarily agree with that. The human is extraordinarily complex. Ask yourself: when were jackets invented?
Survival, in fact, is relative. Is it survival for a month, a year? It is my opinion, for instance, that in several decades man will start living forever. It will be a brand new day, with spare parts, genetics. Who will be the first person to get an artificial head? It will be found useful for intergalactic travel, and why not live forever? How, you ask, can one survive on canned peas for 6,000 years? To this I refer to Max Lerner, who has written: “Of the many things we have done to democracy in the past, the worst has been the indignity of taking it for granted.”
Once I thought I could easily survive in Vermont on Maple syrup on snow. Snow comes forever. Then I read a book which said you could get scurvy from too many snow cones. In Hometown, USA, they say you need the Chevrolet car to survive. They say you need toothpaste to make it. These bastards have set themselves up in the necessity business. They have mass manipulated a culture to think it CANNOT SURVIVE without certain shit.
Recently I was up at Prestige Eggs discussing the purchase of several eggs. My friend, Monty Carper, said to me, “I cry when my chick makes it with another guy.” I looked at Monty and I said, “Monty, it’s boring to have the same flavors all the time. Think positively.” As I was talking, my favorite dentist, Dr. Mackeral, came along. “A simple life cannot be attained simply,” she said. Then we all went to her office, where we sucked up a little laughing gas. Dr. Mackeral is a laughing gas freak. She goes through two tanks a week, herself — $75 (wholesale) of nitrous oxide. To Dr. Mackeral, having all that nitrous is a matter of survival. Sometimes, to me, that she has sucked up so much laughing gas is a matter of my survival. More than once, Dr. Mackeral made mistakes while drilling my teeth, like not putting drills in the bit.
Now we must ask ourselves — is it all in the mind? By canned peas alone? What about love? As Bhartrihari sayeth: “Love is the crocodiles in the river of desire.” Hold your breath for a few minutes, say slowly, quietly — and without moving your tongue — “Am I an alien life form?” Measles, you see, is a chain through all cultures. So survival, short term, medium term, long term, infinite — it’s a nostalgic notion, but not necessarily true.
