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People on vacation exhibit sides not quite so readily seen in home neighborhoods where, for instance, waving one’s unmanicured bare feet at strangers would be seen as odd or even nasty. 

But, then, asks a Ranger on the loose, what isn’t odd or offensive about a species able to confuse self-rejection with positive affirmation? We, like the automobile behind the expression, are Doozies to the core of our delusions. Quite an accomplishment if you think on it.

Some, maybe most, which would be lost to my peculiarities, travel for experience or amusement, perhaps both. Usually being both loud and costly, fun time is something I avoid where and when possible, I can be tricked into amusements, but not too easily or for long. 

There’s a nice sense of groupiness in shared entertainment, but of itself that is lean reward, less compelling to my eye than finding something of benefit to my meager human side than the rigmarole of pretending to share values of costume or belief without conviction. 

Truth is, though on holiday I drag my usual self along. To ruin the party? That’s my way. What’s yours? I’ll wager whether via fun fakery or old grumpery things will quite often, oblivious to commend, turn their own direction to plant us in bewilderland. Who sees love at first sight coming or fated rejection when they loom. 

In general, our fellow (is fellow considered sexist these days?) beans (hardly gendered, that) are amiable enough if not too much, much or anything much is required of them. 

Particular favorites of mine and perhaps yours are the lost who pause amid foot (thank heavens not roadway) traffic to pause for a puzzled think, a reconnoiter of sorts, before moving. A thoughtful thinker might first step aside, out of the way. But not the real-deal dopes. They pause any-old-where, a right coming with central standing in, as they wish to see it, a private system with their special selves circled like a sun by adoring bodies of lesser magnificence. 

I’m not confident of accuracy, but it seems self-centeredness impairs one’s spatial awareness of others. Millennials using cell phones in public show similar disability, one I’ve investigated by standing still as a talker plods forward.  I only do so to learn if they see beyond their phone shields. They do. Or at least the glowers on their faces show awareness of having their ploy foiled. This test is not without some reward after all.

A person can’t (meaning I can’t) help wonder how the planet’s supposedly smartest and most advanced citizen behaves with greater stupidity than wildebeest, far better at coordinated herd behavior then we who stand blocking the flow while tackling the great puzzle of which way to turn with a mug of tea. 

A too-long sentence for a simple observation. 

Where to perch? Where sit; a puzzlement for many among us. I hope readers will not scorn my simple observation, one I give with some evidence based on seeing so many on the public prowl doing so with portable potable aqua in hand, a practice likely brought forward from simple fear of finding no place to sit in order to imbibe in comfort. 

On the go must become us. In any case we do so much.

Considered at all, a person might question how we reached exalted heights being so remarkably, almost grievously thick. 

Could be (I speculate idly) civilization has weakened us to pampered docility. If the powerful allosaur or velociraptor couldn’t cut it what chance do we dullards stand in the race of survival of the fittest? 
The concept, however, applies rightly to species of groups and not individuals. Is it a comforting thought to imagine a small sample of fittest being enough to carry along a host of marginals? 

In case you wonder, I do not mean anything sociological or political. Comparison or analysis of the sort would, in any case, be quite ignored by natural selection which doesn’t need texts or theories to have pushed life forward for years mounting into the hundreds of billions. The universe may be oblivious to us, as we are of it, especially when we think and act as if control resided in our little ape hands.

I, I imagine well as you, don’t like facing the obvious problem of first needing to believe my own doubtful notions before questioning the notions of others. If honest I need nod toward the sorry possibility many of my firmest beliefs might easily be frail fantasies. Personal certainty makes no difference. 

Neither as individuals, societies nor species do we understand beyond our limited scope or control much of anything. Belief that paying three times a going price does not in fact mean my fresh fruit is better than that sold to is organic in other than label. 

Belief needs trust, doesn’t it? The seller you or I trust is likewise bound by trust. Visiting an organic farm in the past doesn’t mean the same practices prevail now or were more than pretend when offered as proof.

You and I live in bubbles of belief where application of a label has to, must, stand for a true picture of organic or fascist or faith or politics. 

If any of us wishes a life of disappointment and awful impossibility all that’s needed is take an abstraction seriously. We can and do punish ourselves seeking things that can’t and don’t exist, such as fairness and equality. Not ever going to be, not among grains of sand, dandelion seeds or the density of ores. Wishing for better in our or other lives is nice enough, perhaps admirable. But why lumber life with godawful expectation impossible to find much less meet? 

The posh make-believe form of diversity babbled ‘bout by experts is not the diversity we carry awkwardly, often with pain over equaling personal ability to meet the challenge.

An irony. Diverse means not fitting in, being entirely OK. A steep price. Yes. But through bearing its pain the gift of difference might grow, little or much. 

Learning may hurt, may lead to uncomfortable unknowns not appreciated until past the door.