On drafting a Fool’s Manifesto for Modern Times

I can’t or won’t, and I can and will.

I can’t or won’t:

• accept that the whole joint is going down the shitter;
• see the world through one lens, be it race, class, gender, political affiliation, religion, ethnicity, or football code;
• lose my humour;
• plead guilty to the crimes of others;
• forget about history and beauty;
• constantly filter out any frailties or doubts;
• keep poking my own wounds with through bad choices and inauthentic relationships;
• pretend that any music after 1986 is worth listening to, or;
• always cross the street on the green light.

I can and will:

• admit that I know very little;
• continue to laugh at myself and my world;
• put pen to paper to make some sense of stuff and provide solace to self;
• only give advice when asked for it;
• desperately resist the digital vortex;
• go bush;
• see the world in kaleidoscopic terms for all its diversity and complexity;
• try to listen and lead;
• let go and let God;
• continue to suffer with the New York Mets;
• sit on a grass hill in the sun at Henson Park, drinking beer with family and friends, and hoping the Newtown Jets win while not caring about the score;
• think aloud and cop criticism for it;
• be inspired by brave limitless peers;
• work for folks and causes who may not be as well off and that I’m placed to help;
• defend the Constitution, and love my adopted country and respect it’s first people;
• reinvent myself a lot for both the right and wrong reasons;
• seek the grace in others with curiousity and compassion – and stuff it up a million times along the way;
• hold my kin close, and;
• always move forward.

Sworn on this day in a Kyiv cafe by Fool-in-Chief.